The High Court yesterday upheld a ruling that former Ting Hsin International Group (頂新集團) executive Wei Ying-chun (魏應充) be fined and not face more jail time for his role in a 2014 cooking oil scandal.
The High Court’s Taichung Branch upheld the decision on 83 counts — which carried a 10-year, two-month prison sentence that could be commuted to a fine of NT$3.71 million (US$120,800), or NT$1,000 per day of the prison term — after the High Prosecutors’ Office did not appeal.
The decision to commute the penalty sparked outrage online, with comments on the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) article about the ruling condemning the justice system.
Photo: Chang Jui-chen, Taipei Times
One Internet user surnamed Kuo (郭) wrote: “How can judges permit him to merely pay a fine and avoid prison?”
“He and the Wei family are rich. They only fear getting locked up,” they said. “This kind of ruling encourages wealthy people to commit crimes.”
A person surnamed Chien (錢) wrote that a “10-year sentence means it is a serious crime, so he should be imprisoned. The dinosaur judges and prosecutors who decided not to appeal should be charged with dereliction of duty.”
“Are Taiwan’s courts permitting criminals who are rich to not serve prison time?” another person wrote.
Wei has been sentenced to prison three times for his role in the scandal.
Most recently, he was convicted in July last year and sentenced to nine years and two months for contravening the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法) and other offenses.
Wei was released on January after serving only six months, with judicial officials saying that portions of the sentence could be commuted to fines totaling NT$176 million, which the Wei family paid in January, and that he was eligible for parole for good behavior.
Moreover, Wei’s sentence included time he had already served pending earlier investigations and hearings, they said.
In 2014, investigators found that Wei and other company executives instructed that animal feed-grade material from Vietnamese firm Dai Hanh Phuc Co be imported.
Wei sought to cut costs by changing the formulas for 14 blended-oil products his companies produced, including one falsely marketed as a premium class of blended oil that was actually 98 percent palm oil.
The scandal created a food-safety furor and led to class-action lawsuits against Ting Hsin and its subsidiaries.
Wei’s first conviction was for breaches of food safety rules and fraud, with the Intellectual Property Court in April 2017 handing him a two-year term, of which he served just over 500 days before being paroled in December 2018.
MAKING WAVES: China’s maritime militia could become a nontraditional threat in war, clogging up shipping lanes to prevent US or Japanese intervention, a report said About 1,900 Chinese ships flying flags of convenience and fishing vessels that participated in China’s military exercises around Taiwan last month and in January have been listed for monitoring, Coast Guard Administration (CGA) Deputy Director-General Hsieh Ching-chin (謝慶欽) said yesterday. Following amendments to the Commercial Port Act (商港法) and the Law of Ships (船舶法) last month, the CGA can designate possible berthing areas or deny ports of call for vessels suspected of loitering around areas where undersea cables can be accessed, Oceans Affairs Council Minister Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) said. The list of suspected ships, originally 300, had risen to about 1,900 as
DAREDEVIL: Honnold said it had always been a dream of his to climb Taipei 101, while a Netflix producer said the skyscraper was ‘a real icon of this country’ US climber Alex Honnold yesterday took on Taiwan’s tallest building, becoming the first person to scale Taipei 101 without a rope, harness or safety net. Hundreds of spectators gathered at the base of the 101-story skyscraper to watch Honnold, 40, embark on his daredevil feat, which was also broadcast live on Netflix. Dressed in a red T-shirt and yellow custom-made climbing shoes, Honnold swiftly moved up the southeast face of the glass and steel building. At one point, he stepped onto a platform midway up to wave down at fans and onlookers who were taking photos. People watching from inside
Japan’s strategic alliance with the US would collapse if Tokyo were to turn away from a conflict in Taiwan, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said yesterday, but distanced herself from previous comments that suggested a possible military response in such an event. Takaichi expressed her latest views on a nationally broadcast TV program late on Monday, where an opposition party leader criticized her for igniting tensions with China with the earlier remarks. Ties between Japan and China have sunk to the worst level in years after Takaichi said in November that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could bring about a Japanese
The WHO ignored early COVID-19 warnings from Taiwan, US Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services Jim O’Neill said on Friday, as part of justification for Washington withdrawing from the global health body. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday said that the US was pulling out of the UN agency, as it failed to fulfill its responsibilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. The WHO “ignored early COVID warnings from Taiwan in 2019 by pretending Taiwan did not exist, O’Neill wrote on X on Friday, Taiwan time. “It ignored rigorous science and promoted lockdowns.” The US will “continue international coordination on infectious
RSS