The US won arrest warrants for three Taiwanese men — a former president of China-based Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Co (福建晉華) and two engineers — charged with stealing secrets from Idaho-based Micron Technology Inc.
The effort to apprehend the three men — former Fujian Jinhua president Stephen Chen (陳正坤), and Ho Chien-ting (何建廷) and Wang Yong-ming (王永銘), who work for Taiwan-based United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) — is notable because they were charged in 2018 in the first case filed under the “China initiative” of US President Donald Trump’s administration targeting trade-secret theft, hacking and economic espionage.
However, legal experts have said there is little motivation for the three to appear in a US court, although they said that Taipei and Washington might reach an agreement to extradite them from Taiwan.
Photo: Hung You-fang, Taipei Times
A federal magistrate judge in San Francisco issued the warrants on Wednesday after the three men failed to show up for their arraignments.
While the prosecution of Fujian Jinhua, a Chinese state-owned chipmaker, has hobbled China’s aspirations of mass producing memory chips, the case has crawled along, even as the US Department of Justice said that the “China initiative” would prioritize rapid action.
The arraignments of the engineers were repeatedly postponed by agreement between the US and their lawyers.
However, on Wednesday, in a three-minute hearing, a US prosecutor requested the warrants, telling the judge that she knew the defendants would not show up after talking to their lawyers on Monday.
“Their clients are not here for different reasons,” Assistant US Attorney Laura Vartain Horn told the judge, without offering details. “The appropriate thing to do, and what the government requests, is a warrant for each of the individual defendants.”
UMC and Fujian Jinhua have pleaded not guilty.
UMC said it cannot comment on the arrest warrants on its employees.
After the justice department billed the matter as a banner prosecution under a special initiative, there might be “political pressure to do something about this case and chalk up a win,” said Calvin Lee, a criminal defense lawyer.
Beyond appearances, the US also has a responsibility to pursue the accused engineers, said Preston Pugh, a former prosecutor who works with Lee.
Even if there is no way for prosecutors to realistically get the men into a US court, “they can’t lay down and not do anything about it,” Pugh said.
The justice department might also ask Taiwan to extradite the men “in return for the US doing if not the same, some other gesture,” Pugh said.
“This is not an off-the-shelf agreement, and not one that happens often, but it has happened,” he said.
Taiwan does not have an extradition treaty with the US.
Ho and Wang, who previously worked for Micron before moving to UMC, and a third UMC staffer, Rong Le-tien (戎樂天), on June 12 were found guilty by the Taichung District Court of breaches of the Trade Secrets Act (營業秘密法) by leaking sensitive information to Hsinchu-based UMC after leaving Micron.
UMC was developing DRAM chip manufacturing technologies in collaboration with Fujian Jinhua through a Chinese subsidiary. The project was terminated in 2017 after they were sentenced to prison terms of four-and-a-half to six-and-a-half years, and fined between NT$4 million and NT$6 million (US$134,953 and US$202,429).
The Taichung court also fined UMC NT$100 million.
Additional reporting by Lisa Wang
RETHINK? The defense ministry and Navy Command Headquarters could take over the indigenous submarine project and change its production timeline, a source said Admiral Huang Shu-kuang’s (黃曙光) resignation as head of the Indigenous Submarine Program and as a member of the National Security Council could affect the production of submarines, a source said yesterday. Huang in a statement last night said he had decided to resign due to national security concerns while expressing the hope that it would put a stop to political wrangling that only undermines the advancement of the nation’s defense capabilities. Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) yesterday said that the admiral, her older brother, felt it was time for him to step down and that he had completed what he
Taiwan has experienced its most significant improvement in the QS World University Rankings by Subject, data provided on Sunday by international higher education analyst Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) showed. Compared with last year’s edition of the rankings, which measure academic excellence and influence, Taiwanese universities made great improvements in the H Index metric, which evaluates research productivity and its impact, with a notable 30 percent increase overall, QS said. Taiwanese universities also made notable progress in the Citations per Paper metric, which measures the impact of research, achieving a 13 percent increase. Taiwanese universities gained 10 percent in Academic Reputation, but declined 18 percent
UNDER DISCUSSION: The combatant command would integrate fast attack boat and anti-ship missile groups to defend waters closest to the coastline, a source said The military could establish a new combatant command as early as 2026, which would be tasked with defending Taiwan’s territorial waters 24 nautical miles (44.4km) from the nation’s coastline, a source familiar with the matter said yesterday. The new command, which would fall under the Naval Command Headquarters, would be led by a vice admiral and integrate existing fast attack boat and anti-ship missile groups, along with the Naval Maritime Surveillance and Reconnaissance Command, said the source, who asked to remain anonymous. It could be launched by 2026, but details are being discussed and no final timetable has been announced, the source
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft