The Kaohsiung branch of the Taiwan High Court yesterday upheld the conviction of former legislator Yu Ling-ya (余玲雅), issuing a nine-month sentence on a breach-of-trust charge for arranging to use school money to pay an office assistant.
Yu, 67, was last year given a two-year jail sentence by the Kaohsiung Ciaotou District Court.
Yu appealed the ruling to the High Court, which ruled that because she had cooperated with investigators and returned the money to the school, the sentence would be reduced to a nine-month prison term.
The decision was final and cannot be appealed.
Yu won legislative elections twice, representing the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) for districts in what was then Kaohsiung County from 1993 to 1999.
When Yu was chairwoman of Kao Yuan Technology College in 1988, she was accused of transferring money from the college to pay the salary of her office assistant, surnamed Huang (黃).
Investigators said that the payments continued until 2006 and totaled about NT$6 million (US$196,361) over the period.
Prosecutors charged Yu with breach of trust, saying she listed Huang as an employee of the college and paid the salary from the school’s budget, despite knowing that Huang was working in her personal office.
Yu is the granddaughter of former Kaohsiung County commissioner Yu Deng-fa (余登發), a prominent independent political leader of southern Taiwan who opposed the then-one-party rule of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) during the Martial Law era.
Yu Deng-fa is well known as the patriarch of the Yu family, a powerful political force for the DPP in southern Taiwan, which also included his daughter-in-law, Yu Chen Yueh-ying (余陳月瑛) — a Kaohsiung County commissioner from 1985 to 1993 — and grandson, former minister of the interior Yu Cheng-hsien (余政憲).
SPACE VETERAN: Kjell N. Lindgren, who helps lead NASA’s human spaceflight missions, has been on two expeditions on the ISS and has spent 311 days in space Taiwan-born US astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is to visit Taiwan to promote technological partnerships through one of the programs organized by the US for its 250th national anniversary. Lindgren would be in Taiwan from Tuesday to Saturday next week as part of the US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ US Speaker Program, organized to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement yesterday. Lindgren plans to engage with key leaders across the nation “to advance cutting-edge technological partnerships and inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers,”
UNREASONABLE SURVEILLANCE: A camera targeted on an road by a neighbor captured a man’s habitual unsignaled turn into home, netting him dozens of tickets The Taichung High Administrative Court has canceled all 45 tickets given to a man for failing to use a turn signal while driving, as it considered long-term surveillance of his privacy more problematic than the traffic violations. The man, surnamed Tseng (曾), lives in Changhua County and was reported 45 times within a month for failing to signal while driving when he turned into the alley where his residence is. The reports were filed by his neighbor, who set up security cameras that constantly monitored not only the alley but also the door and yard of Tseng’s house. The surveillance occurred from July
A Japan Self-Defense Forces vessel entered the Taiwan Strait yesterday, Japanese media reported. After passing through the Taiwan Strait, the Ikazuchi was to proceed to the South China Sea to take part in a joint military exercise with the US and the Philippines, the reports said. Japan Self-Defense Force vessels were first reported to have passed through the strait in September, 2024, with two further transits taking place in February and June last year, the Asahi Shimbun reported. Yesterday’s transit also marked the first time since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi took office that a Japanese warship has been sent through the Taiwan
ANOTHER OPTION: The 13-year-old, whose residency status was revoked for holding a Chinese passport, could still apply for residency on humanitarian grounds, the government said The Executive Yuan has rejected an appeal from a 13-year-old Chinese student surnamed Lu (陸), whose permanent residency was revoked after immigration officers discovered he held a Chinese passport. Lu in December 2023 applied to settle in Taiwan to be with his mother, surnamed Lin (林), who is a Taiwan resident, an appeal decision released this month by the Executive Yuan showed. Lin settled in Taiwan after marrying a Taiwanese man in 2003, but the two divorced in 2011, and after marrying a Chinese man, she had Lu, the Executive Yuan’s appeals committee said. Lu’s application was approved in December 2024, and in
RSS