The Kaohsiung branch of the Taiwan High Court yesterday reversed a guilty verdict and acquitted the owners of Chan Shen Country Food Co, a tofu processing factory in the city, in a case of alleged exploitation of migrant workers.
In the first ruling in December last year, Kaohsiung’s Ciaotou District Court gave each of the owners, a couple surnamed Tsai (蔡) and Cheng (鄭), a seven-month sentence.
The Kaohsiung Labor Affairs Bureau had previously imposed a NT$1.2 million (US$40,126 at the current exchange rate) fine on the company.
The case has received much media coverage, as it involved the alleged mistreatment and financial exploitation of three foreign migrant workers, breaches of labor law and collusion with a labor brokerage agency.
One of the three migrant workers, an Indonesian woman nicknamed Afan, said she had been held against her will and worked as a virtual slave for 14 years, laboring 15 hours a day and without any days off while locked up on the second floor of the tofu factory.
However, the high court reached the acquittal verdict after examining the evidence and hearing testimony, which indicated that wages paid by the owners had met the requirements of the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法).
Public prosecutors can still appeal the case.
The investigation found that the owners did not restrict the movement of the migrant workers, and that all three of them had cellphones to make calls, the court said.
“We discovered that during their period of employment, they were allowed to move about freely and were not barred from leaving the company; their movements were not restricted or monitored,” it said.
According to investigators, the three foreign workers were paid monthly wages of NT$21,000, NT$23,000 and NT$26,000 for working six to nine hours per day from Monday to Saturday.
It was found that on occasions that they had to work up to 10 or 11 hours per day they were given overtime pay, with the highest total being NT$36,000 per month.
The court said the wages were “reasonable,” comparable with the statutory minimum monthly salary, which was NT$21,009 last year and increased to NT$22,000 in January.
The court also found that the migrant workers’ treatment at work and their wages were comparable to those of Taiwanese working similar factory jobs.
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