Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇) has been criticized for her comments about Taipei MRT killer Cheng Chieh (鄭捷), who went on a stabbing spree on the Taipei MRT’s Bannan Line on May 21, 2014, and was executed on Tuesday.
A couple of hours after Cheng’s execution, Ying posted a message on a forum on the Taipei City Council’s Web site and Facebook page condemning Cheng.
“In my experience counseling Cheng Chieh, he was like a student the first time we met, arranging the desks and chairs and waiting for others to attend the session,” Ying wrote. “During the second session, I asked Cheng whether he regretted the killings, to which he replied: ‘Not in the slightest.’”
Photo: Chou Min-hung, Taipei Times
“The third session was held right after he was summoned to court. He protested strongly, saying: ‘The media’s coverage deviated greatly from what happened in court,’” Ying said. “During that time, he had been sent to solitary confinement for breaking the rules, yet not only had he denied having done anything wrong, he led others in following the rules. Even though he was executed tonight [Tuesday night], I will never forget the look in Cheng’s eyes. He gazed at me and dodged my glance at the same time.”
“In my more than 20 years of counseling, Cheng was among the death row inmates who caused me to make sure that I have brought an alarm to the counseling sessions. He was dreadful. There was never repentance in his behavior,” she wrote.
Ying’s remarks prompted a response from the Taipei Detention Center, saying that only two counselors had talked to Cheng, and Ying was not one of them.
The center’s response sparked reactions from Internet users, who ridiculed Ying, saying she fabricated stories to gain publicity.
However, Ying protested the center’s statement, saying that although she had not counseled Cheng in a one-on-one setting, she was a voluntary counselor and had counseled Cheng, among other inmates, at three group sessions.
Ying on Thursday said: “It is a cold, hard fact that I counseled Cheng three times… I did not provide one-on-one counseling to Cheng, and I did not think there was a point in specifying that.”
However, Ying’s remarks did not seem to change some Internet users’ opinions of her.
“These people are always talking about serving justice,” Facebook user Jean Lo said. “They give you such meticulous details about how Cheng was sedated before the execution, how the three gunshots were fired… However, now it seems everyone involved in Cheng’s execution is fishing for compliments by hitting a dead duck... This whole show makes me want to puke.”
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