A rash of lawsuits and public clarifications have emerged from the intense investigation into the murder of naval Captain Yin Ching-feng (
Helen Liu (
It had long been reported that a Taiwanese woman named Lily Liu accepted kickbacks from the Lafayette frigates manufacturer and served as a go-between to bribe officials in Beijing into allowing Taiwan to buy the frigates without China's obstruction.
On Wednesday and Thursday the three newspapers identified Lily Liu as Helen Liu, saying it was the conclusion reached by the special investigation force appointed to solve the high-profile case.
After appearing at a press conference to clarify that she was not Lily Liu on Thursday, Helen Liu yesterday morning went to Taipei District Prosecutors' Office to sue the three newspapers which made the reports.
"Such reports are irresponsible and unethical," Liu said. "The press has caused harm to my reputation by wrongly naming me without interviewing me before printing [the allegations]."
She said her English name has always been Helen, not Lily.
She acknowledged that she is an aunt of Chu Pen-li (
The United Daily News yesterday printed an apology to Liu, saying wrong information was cited in the previous day's report.
Meanwhile, another Chinese-language newspaper, China Times Express, yesterday reported that Yin's sister said she personally believed Helen Liu is Lily Liu while Yin's widow said she was uncertain on the matter.
During the past several weeks of the reopening of the investigation into the Yin case, media sources have repeatedly published information which the investigation team had officially classified as secret, such as naming high-ranking officials suspected of involvement in the arms procurement-related case.
Former chiefs of the general staff Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村) and Liu Ho-chien (劉和謙), for example, have made public announcements to say they were not involved in the case after media reports said they were.
In a related suit filed on Thursday, a man accused the State Public Prosecutor General and head of the Yin murder case special investigative force, Lu Jen-fa (
The accuser said the investigation force barred several high-ranking military officials from leaving the country without having subpoenaed them and the practice is a breach of the Criminal Procedure Law. Lu did not respond to the claims.
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