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Police mum on fugitives' arrest

The Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) yesterday denied it sent agents to Macau to bring Taiwanese fugitives Hsueh Chiu (薛球) and Chen Yi-hua (陳益華) back from China after they were arrested by police there. They also said they will not pay the NT$16 million in reward money to Chinese police for catching the two fugitives any time before the end of this weekend.

"[The Chinese police] still have not discussed of the details regarding the arrest of Hsueh and Chen arrest. So the rumor stays where it is at this moment," said Kao Cheng-sheng (高政昇), who was recently promoted to deputy commissioner of the CIB.

Kao's remarks were in response to a story in a Chinese-language newspaper yesterday that reported, "CIB officers arrived in Macau on Friday to escort Hsueh and Chen back to Taiwan after they pay off the award on Saturday."

The reward of NT$16 million is the total sum after tax of a NT$20 million reward for information leading to the arrest of the two fugitives, as promised by the Taipei City Government.

Police do not usually make public the arrest of wanted fugitives in a foreign country until the suspect is safely on board a plane or boat on the way back to Taiwan.

Hsueh and Chen were arrested separately by the Chinese police in Xiamen last month. Police here sustained negotiations with their Chinese counterparts regarding the fugitive's extradition to Taiwan since their arrests.

Hsueh and Chen gained notoriety in Taiwan as a result of their involvement in several shooting and kidnapping cases, but currently, they are not murder suspects.

The two are suspected of planning and carrying out the kidnapping of the three sons and brother-in-law of a wealthy Chiayi businessman in March last year, and the kidnapping of Taichung City Council Speaker Chang Hung-nien (張宏年) in 2001. Hsueh and Chen released the hostages in the Chiayi case after escaping with NT$4.8 million in ransom money and Chang was released when his family handed over an undisclosed sum, which rumored to be in the area of NT$300 million.

A dispute erupted between prosecutors and judges after Hsueh and Chen were arrested were released on bail and fled in March of 2000.

The two fugitives have been on the run ever since. Undercover police said that they fled to China and have been hiding out in Xiamen since September last year.
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