The Shilin District Court yesterday convicted four Singaporean university students of sexual assault and handed down suspended sentences that would see them avoid prison time, but with conditions preventing them from leaving the nation until their probation expires.
The four were originally sentenced to jail terms of between 20 and 23 months, but the judges suspended the sentences and gave probation of four years for two of them and five years for the other two.
As it was the first ruling on the case, the defendants can appeal the court’s decision.
Photo: Huang chieh, Taipei Times
After a late night of revelry and drinking by the four in December last year, two Taiwanese women said they were raped by the group.
Lau Wei Seng (劉瑋城) was an exchange student at a university in Taipei, while the other three are friends who were reportedly enrolled at universities in Singapore.
The three friends were identified by Singaporean newspaper the Straits Times as Bryan Ong Kun Jun (王琨駿), Tan Juan Yin (陳俊穎) and Lim Wei Xuan (林煒軒).
All four were aged 23 at the time.
Lau testified that he invited the three from Singapore for a visit, with the group touring around the nation before ending the trip at a bed-and-breakfast in Taipei, where the alleged sexual assault took place.
The judges cited an agreement by the four men to pay financial compensation of an undisclosed amount to the two women as justification for the suspended sentences.
The two victims have agreed to the private settlement and reportedly said they were willing to forgive the four men and not pursue the case further, the court ruling said.
While the suspended sentences mean the four men do not have to serve time in prison, their probation requires them to remain in Taiwan until their terms expire, as the judges imposed protective control measures.
The measures require the four to regularly report their activities and whereabouts to probation officers, and any further infraction of the law would see the suspension lifted.
Lau reportedly met one of the women, known as “Siao Fang” (小芳), at a nightclub in Taipei on Dec. 11, and later invited her back to the group’s lodgings to party with his friends.
Siao Fang reportedly invited a friend to the party, drinking late into the night.
Afterward, the two women accused the men of forcing them to have sex while they were inebriated, despite their objections.
The defense said it was consensual sex between adults, quoting Siao Fang as saying that they could have sex with her, but “please don’t hurt my friend.”
A Chinese aircraft carrier group entered Japan’s economic waters over the weekend, before exiting to conduct drills involving fighter jets, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said yesterday. The Liaoning aircraft carrier, two missile destroyers and one fast combat supply ship sailed about 300km southwest of Japan’s easternmost island of Minamitori on Saturday, a ministry statement said. It was the first time a Chinese aircraft carrier had entered that part of Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), a ministry spokesman said. “We think the Chinese military is trying to improve its operational capability and ability to conduct operations in distant areas,” the spokesman said. China’s growing
Nine retired generals from Taiwan, Japan and the US have been invited to participate in a tabletop exercise hosted by the Taipei School of Economics and Political Science Foundation tomorrow and Wednesday that simulates a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan in 2030, the foundation said yesterday. The five retired Taiwanese generals would include retired admiral Lee Hsi-min (李喜明), joined by retired US Navy admiral Michael Mullen and former chief of staff of the Japan Self-Defense Forces general Shigeru Iwasaki, it said. The simulation aims to offer strategic insights into regional security and peace in the Taiwan Strait, it added. Foundation chair Huang Huang-hsiung
PUBLIC WARNING: The two students had been tricked into going to Hong Kong for a ‘high-paying’ job, which sent them to a scam center in Cambodia Police warned the public not to trust job advertisements touting high pay abroad following the return of two college students over the weekend who had been trafficked and forced to work at a cyberscam center in Cambodia. The two victims, surnamed Lee (李), 18, and Lin (林), 19, were interviewed by police after landing in Taiwan on Saturday. Taichung’s Chingshui Police Precinct said in a statement yesterday that the two students are good friends, and Lin had suspended her studies after seeing the ad promising good pay to work in Hong Kong. Lee’s grandfather on Thursday reported to police that Lee had sent
BUILDUP: US General Dan Caine said Chinese military maneuvers are not routine exercises, but instead are ‘rehearsals for a forced unification’ with Taiwan China poses an increasingly aggressive threat to the US and deterring Beijing is the Pentagon’s top regional priority amid its rapid military buildup and invasion drills near Taiwan, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said on Tuesday. “Our pacing threat is communist China,” Hegseth told the US House of Representatives Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense during an oversight hearing with US General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “Beijing is preparing for war in the Indo-Pacific as part of its broader strategy to dominate that region and then the world,” Hegseth said, adding that if it succeeds, it could derail
RSS