The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday sought a jail sentence of 24 years for Farglory Group (遠雄集團) founder Chao Teng-hsiung (趙藤雄) on charges that include bribery and breach of trust in cases involving several public construction projects.
After a four-month investigation, prosecutors yesterday indicted 31 people, including Chao, New Taipei City Councilor Chou Sheng-kao (周勝考) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and former Taipei Department of Finance commissioner Lee Sush-der (李述德).
At 8pm, Chao, considered the central figure in the four cases relating to Farglory Group, was released on a record bail of NT$550 million (US$18.23 million).
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
The judge imposed restrictions on Chao’s movement, ordering him to remain within his home, prohibiting him from leaving the country and requiring him to report to his local police station every day.
Besides the Taipei Dome project, which has been mired in controversy and is unfinished due to a halt in construction because of years of legal wrangling, authorities investigated Chao on suspicion of embezzlement of funds from Farglory Life Insurance Co (遠雄人壽) in 2007 and 2008; and bribery of New Taipei City officials in 2013 to obtain contracts for two real-estate development projects — the rezoning of a former coal mine in New Taipei City’s Tucheng District (土城) and a factory in New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang District (新莊) — and a series of government urban renewal projects, which were all won by Chao’s Farglory Land Development Co (遠雄建設).
Prosecutors allege that Chao with his Farglory Group subsidiary companies secured the contracts and land development projects by giving bribes to government officials and people involved in the decisionmaking process through third parties.
Prosecutors requested a sentence of 10 years for Chao for falsifying financial reports and 14 years for bribery, including eight years for paying kickbacks to Chou and other New Taipei City officials in 2013.
Prosecutors are also seeking a 10-year sentence for Chou, who allegedly took and offered bribes for construction projects in Tucheng and Sinjhuang, and a 10-year jail term for Lee for violations in connection with the Taipei Dome project.
Lee has been indicted for financially benefiting Farglory Land Development Co, the main contractor for the Taipei Dome project. He was head of the city’s finance department from 1998 to 2006 when former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was Taipei mayor.
Prosecutors said that Lee represented the Taipei City Government during the contract negotiations for the Taipei Dome project.
“Lee was deceitful and misrepresented his role, and colluded with Farglory, making detrimental decisions against the rights of Taipei residents,” Taipei Deputy Chief Prosecutor Chou Shih-yu (周士榆) said.
A number of politicians, city government officials and other Farglory executives were also charged, with prosecutors seeking a nine-year sentence for Hsu Ming-wen (許銘文), former chief executive of the semi-government Taiwan Architecture & Building Center, and laid charges against Hung Chia-hung (洪嘉宏), the former head of the Urban and Rural Development Branch of the Construction and Planning Agency.
Prosecutors sought suspended sentences with probation for 13 defendants who allegedly had lesser roles and who cooperated with the investigation.
Prosecutors have launched a separate judicial probe into Ma in relation to the Taipei Dome project to investigate if he was involved in any financial impropriety or illegal activities during his tenure as Taipei mayor, Chou Shih-yu said.
“Chao and other members of staff have fully cooperated with the judicial investigation. It is regretful prosecutors still decided to charge them. We will continue to work with the judiciary to clarify these cases,” Farglory Group said in a statement.
Additional reporting by CNA
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on Friday expressed concern over the rate at which China is diversifying its military exercises, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday. “The rates of change on the depth and breadth of their exercises is the one non-linear effect that I’ve seen in the last year that wakes me up at night or keeps me up at night,” Paparo was quoted by FT as saying while attending the annual Sedona Forum at the McCain Institute in Arizona. Paparo also expressed concern over the speed with which China was expanding its military. While the US
SHIFT: Taiwan’s better-than-expected first-quarter GDP and signs of weakness in the US have driven global capital back to emerging markets, the central bank head said The central bank yesterday blamed market speculation for the steep rise in the local currency, and urged exporters and financial institutions to stay calm and stop panic sell-offs to avoid hurting their own profitability. The nation’s top monetary policymaker said that it would step in, if necessary, to maintain order and stability in the foreign exchange market. The remarks came as the NT dollar yesterday closed up NT$0.919 to NT$30.145 against the US dollar in Taipei trading, after rising as high as NT$29.59 in intraday trading. The local currency has surged 5.85 percent against the greenback over the past two sessions, central
RSS