Ministry escorts accused fraudster back from Palau

A man wanted for fraud since August 2003 was escorted back to the country from Palau, sources from the National Police Agency's Criminal Investigation Bureau said yesterday.

Chiang Kuang-yeh (姜廣業) was escorted by police back to Taipei from the South Pacific island country around noon yesterday and was immediately taken into custody by the bureau.

According to investigators, Chiang began to run advertisements in major daily newspapers in Taiwan to attract investments in the Palau Evergreen International Hotel.

The ad claimed the hotel was a failsafe investment with investors enjoying ownership of units in the hotel and having guaranteed regular returns on their investment.

An unknown number of investors around the nation discovered that they had been conned after the hotel ran an ad several months later to announce that it had never authorized Chiang to raise money in Taiwan, nor contracted him to be a sales manager.

Chiang fled Taiwan and was reported to have been living mainly in Palau.