The Supreme Prosecutors’ Office Special Investigation Panel (SIP) yesterday said it would not appeal an acquittal ruling on forgery and corruption charges against five retired senior Navy officers for their involvement in the Lafayette procurement scandal, thus bringing the trial to a conclusion.
SIP spokesman Chen Hung-ta (陳宏達) said the panel had concluded there was not enough evidence to prove the defendants had engaged in illegal activities in the acquisition of the French destroyers.
corruption
The defendants were retired Vice Admiral and former chief of the Navy’s Shipbuilding Office Lei Hsueh-ming (雷學明), Rear Admiral Wang Chin-sheng (王琴生), Captain Kang Shih-chun (康世淳), Captain Hsuan Peng-lai (宣蓬萊) and Commander Cheng Chih-po (程志波).
The five were indicted on charges of forgery and corruption in July 2001.
The Taipei District Court found the defendants not guilty in June, but said the verdict remained classified and would not be made public as it involved national security.
national security
The district court spent months assessing the national security nature of the matter and delayed making the verdict public until last week, Chen said.
After going through the verdict, SIP officials decided not to bring the case to the Taiwan High Court.
The indictment said the Navy had inflated the price of the six Lafayette-class frigates purchased 19 years ago and illegally directed NT$10.8 billion (US$337 million) to their French manufacturer Thomson-CSF (now know as Thales).
arbitration victory
In May, Taiwan won a case it filed with the international commercial arbitration court in the frigate deal, with the France-based court ordering Thales to repay the Taiwanese government about US$861 million.
Meanwhile, Chen said the SIP would appeal the district court’s ruling against retired navy Captain Kuo Li-heng (郭力恆) and his brother, Kuo Wen-tien (郭問天), at the Taiwan High Court.
In a separate trial, the district court in August sentenced Kuo Li-heng to 15 years in prison for taking bribes in the Lafayette procurement deal.
Kuo was convicted of accepting US$17 million in kickbacks from arms dealer Andrew Wang (汪傳浦) to facilitate the deal.
Kuo Wen-tien received a two-year jail term for helping him launder the ill-gotten money by opening bank accounts in Switzerland.
The cases also stemmed from the 1991 Lafayette deal.
A French judicial probe was launched in 2001 to investigate claims that much of the money paid by Taiwan a decade earlier went towards commissions to middlemen, politicians and military officers in Taiwan, China and France.
Taiwanese prosecutors concluded in the same year that as much as US$400 million in bribes may have been paid throughout the course of the deal.
Wang was allegedly tasked with convincing Taiwan to buy the ships and is the main suspect in the case, but remains at large.
Additional reporting by Staff Writer
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