By Jimmy Chuang
Staff Reporter
The Taiwan High Court yesterday found entertainer Hu Gua (胡瓜) not guilty in the final verdict of cheating fellow mahjong gamblers.
The Taipei District Court found Hu innocent in a first trial in January.
The sentence for Hu's brother, Hu Chi-hsuan (胡技烜), was cut from 30 months to 28 months. His friend Tien Shu-ling's (田淑玲) 22-month sentence from the first trial was upheld. The sentence for another friend, Hsu Chih-huang (許志煌), was cut in half to nine months.
Prosecutors allege that Hsu, who set up hidden cameras in the air conditioning vents of an apartment, watched monitors in an adjacent room and passed information to the entertainer's brother about his competitors' mahjong tiles.
Tien discovered the scam and demanded a share of the spoils, threatening to go public.
Prosecutors say that Hu Chi-hsuan, Hsu and Tien cheated mahjong players out of more than NT$20 million (US$606,060). The money must be repaid.
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