Lee Tai-an (李泰安), convicted of involvement in a South Link railway train derailment, was sentenced yesterday to 13 years in jail by the Taiwan High Court’s Kaohsiung branch.
Yesterday’s ruling was the third verdict for Lee, who can still appeal the case to the Supreme Court. In Lee’s first and second trials, he was was sentenced to life imprisonment and 18 years in prison by the Pingtung District Court and the Taiwan High Court’s Kaohsiung branch, respectively.
The ruling yesterday said Lee Tai-an and his brother Lee Shuang-chuan (李雙全), who committed suicide on March 23, 2006, as investigators began suspecting his involvement in the train derailment, conspired to destroy railway infrastructure and murder Chen Hong-chen (陳氏紅琛), the Vietnamese spouse of Lee Shuang-chuan.
The ruling said Lee Shuang-chuan had been the primary perpetrator, while Lee Tai-an was an accessory, so the court decided to reduce his sentence. The court found Lee Tai-an guilty of murder, destruction of railway infrastructure, endangering passenger safety and illegitimately collecting insurance payouts after Chen’s death.
Chen did not die in the train derailment — she was murdered, the ruling said. The incident occurred on March 17, 2006, when an express train traveling from Taitung to Kaohsiung derailed in Pingtung County. Among the passengers on the train were Lee Shuang-chuan — a Taiwan Railway Administration employee — and his wife.
Chen died in hospital after the derailment, but prosecutors became suspicious after they discovered that Lee Shuang-chuan had taken out a NT$20 million (US$624, 498) life insurance policy on his wife, which covered accidental death, a few days prior to the derailment.
The ruling said Chen had first been injected with Etumine, a strong sedative mainly administered to patients with mental illnesses, and then with snake poison, by Lee Shuang-chuan before she boarded the train. She was injected with an additional poison after being admitted to the hospital.
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday said it had deployed patrol vessels to expel a China Coast Guard ship and a Chinese fishing boat near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. The China Coast Guard vessel was 28 nautical miles (52km) northeast of Pratas at 6:15am on Thursday, approaching the island’s restricted waters, which extend 24 nautical miles from its shoreline, the CGA’s Dongsha-Nansha Branch said in a statement. The Tainan, a 2,000-tonne cutter, was deployed by the CGA to shadow the Chinese ship, which left the area at 2:39pm on Friday, the statement said. At 6:31pm on Friday,
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy’s (PLAN) third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, would pose a steep challenge to Taiwan’s ability to defend itself against a full-scale invasion, a defense expert said yesterday. Institute of National Defense and Security Research analyst Chieh Chung (揭仲) made the comment hours after the PLAN confirmed the carrier recently passed through the Taiwan Strait to conduct “scientific research tests and training missions” in the South China Sea. China has two carriers in operation — the Liaoning and the Shandong — with the Fujian undergoing sea trials. Although the PLAN needs time to train the Fujian’s air wing and
The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) put Taiwan in danger, Ma Ying-jeou Foundation director Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑) said yesterday, hours after the de facto US embassy said that Beijing had misinterpreted World War II-era documents to isolate Taiwan. The AIT’s comments harmed the Republic of China’s (ROC) national interests and contradicted a part of the “six assurances” stipulating that the US would not change its official position on Taiwan’s sovereignty, Hsiao said. The “six assurances,” which were given by then-US president Ronald Reagan to Taiwan in 1982, say that Washington would not set a date for ending arm sales to Taiwan, consult
A Taiwanese academic yesterday said that Chinese Ambassador to Denmark Wang Xuefeng (王雪峰) disrespected Denmark and Japan when he earlier this year allegedly asked Japan’s embassy to make Taiwan’s representatives leave an event in Copenhagen. The Danish-language Berlingske on Sunday reported the incident in an article with the headline “The emperor’s birthday ended in drama in Copenhagen: More conflict may be on the way between Denmark and China.” It said that on Feb. 26, the Japanese embassy in Denmark held an event for Japanese Emperor Naruhito’s birthday, with about 200 guests in attendance, including representatives from Taiwan. After addressing the Japanese hosts, Wang
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