The Ministry of Justice is considering increasing penalties for child abuse, including eliminating the potential of parole for cases resulting in the deaths of children younger than seven years old, Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) said yesterday.
Cheng was responding to questions from legislators about increasing penalties for child abuse, after two sisters were sentenced last month for causing the death of a one-year-old boy nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴).
The Legislative Yuan’s Judiciary and Organic Laws and Statutes Committee invited officials from the ministry and the Judicial Yuan to report on the factors that influence sentencing guidelines involving the death penalty.
Photo: Lo Pei-de, Taipei Times
The factors include statements from the victims or relatives, the possibility of rehabilitation, as well as 10 items under Article 57 of the Criminal Code that sentencing can take into account, such as motive, education level and the offender’s attitude after the crime.
Lawmakers cited the Kai Kai case as a reason to increase child abuse penalties, after an online petition received thousands of signatures.
The ministry on Tuesday met with a criminal law research team and is to hold another consultation today, soliciting opinions from all sectors, Cheng said.
Any proposed amendments would increase penalties, he added.
The ministry has a zero tolerance view on child abuse, and would revise the law with that principle in mind, he said.
The ministry is also considering eliminating the possibility of parole for those convicted of abuse of children younger than seven that resulted in the child’s death, he added.
The matter touches on constitutional powers and previous judgements, Judicial Yuan Deputy Secretary-General Wang Mei-ying (王梅英) said, adding that the Judicial Yuan respects the rulings of the Constitutional Court.
Although there was bipartisan support for increasing penalties, legislators failed to reach a consensus on proposed amendments.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers previously proposed amendments to articles 271 and 286 of the Criminal Code, increasing the penalty for child abuse resulting in death to the death penalty.
Article 271 says that a person who takes the life of another shall be sentenced to death, life imprisonment or no less than 10 years in prison. Article 286 allows life imprisonment for abuse causing death.
KMT Legislator Wang Hung-wei (王鴻薇) said she hoped the ministry would propose amendments to protect children and use capital punishment to achieve equitable justice.
Everyone wants to protect children, but the legal principles behind amending the law must be clarified, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chuang Jui-hsiung (莊瑞雄) said.
To amend the law after three or six months “would be too long,” DPP caucus chief executive Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said, adding that she hoped the parties could reach a consensus soon.
The ministry is not opposed to amending either article, Deputy Minister of Justice Huang Mou-hsin (黃謀信) said, adding that it would submit legal opinions on amendments within one month for members of the committee.
Lawmakers agreed to defer further discussions for cross-party discussions.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday inaugurated the Danjiang Bridge across the Tamsui River in New Taipei City, saying that the structure would be an architectural icon and traffic artery for Taiwan. Feted as a major engineering achievement, the Danjiang Bridge is 920m long, 211m tall at the top of its pylon, and is the longest single-pylon asymmetric cable-stayed bridge in the world, the government’s Web site for the structure said. It was designed by late Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid. The structure, with a maximum deck of 70m, accommodates road and light rail traffic, and affords a 200m navigation channel for boats,
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
WHAT WAS ALL THAT FOR? Jaw Shaw-kong said that Cheng Li-wen had pushed for more drastic cuts and attacked him, just for the outcome to be nearly identical to his bill The legislature yesterday passed a supplementary budget bill to fund the purchase of separate packages of US military equipment, with the combined amount of spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.8 billion). The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their legislative majority to pass the bill, which runs until 2033 and has two main funding provisions. One was for NT$300 billion of arms sales already approved by the US for Taiwan on Dec. 17 last year, the other was for NT$480 billion for another arms package expected to be announced by Washington. The bill, which fell short of the NT$1.25
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
RSS