The Miaoli District Court on Friday sentenced a Miaoli County hotel employee surnamed Chan (詹) to 50 days in prison for sexually harassing a colleague.
Chan and four other colleagues attended a small gathering in the hotel’s employee dorm on Feb. 20 last year, when Chan crawled on top of the plaintiff and placed his hand near his crotch while he was sleeping on one of the dorm room’s beds.
Having awoken while Chan was on top of him, the plaintiff called the police, the court said in its ruling.
Chan said he was “simply joking” — that he had only placed his hand near the plaintiff’s crotch, but not touched him.
The plaintiff said he could not accept Chan’s excuses.
According to Subparagraph 1, Article 25 of the Sexual Harassment Prevention Act (性騷擾防治法), sexual harassment is the inappropriate, sudden and temporary touching of a person’s body that could be construed as sexual and cause the individual psychological discomfort, the court said.
The law clearly prohibits touching “the chest and buttocks,” but also includes “other private areas of the body,” the court said.
“Objectively speaking, such ‘private areas’ include both male and female genitalia, the inner thigh region and the crotch area,” the court said.
Chan’s action was in contravention of the law, but as he was sorry for his actions and apologized to the plaintiff, he should be sentenced to 50 days in prison, which, if commuted to a fine, should total NT$50,000, the court said.
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