The Taiwan High Court Taichung Branch yesterday upheld a lower court's verdict against Kuangsan Enterprise Group president Tseng Cheng-jen (曾正仁) and sentenced him to a total of 30 years and 10 months in prison.
On April 9, 2001, the Taichung District Court convicted Tseng for violations of the Securities Transaction Law (
Yesterday, the high court decided to uphold the district court's decision to sentence Tseng to a 20-year prison term and fine him NT$300 million for his violations of the Securities Transaction Law.
"Tseng has stolen nearly NT$25 billion from three companies -- including the Kuangsan Group, the Shutayu Security Co and the Taichung Business Bank," said Chen Chi-kang (陳紀綱), the spokesman for the Taiwan High Court Taichung Branch.
"What he did has seriously affected the domestic economy. That was the main reason for us to uphold the initial verdict."
For his crime of forging documents, the high court added four months to the initial sentence, sentencing Tseng to a prison term of eight years and four months, plus a fine of NT$810,000.
Having received the official verdict, Tseng has 10 days to appeal to the Supreme Court on these two charges.
On the last charge of manipulating government officials to forge documents, the high court upheld the original sentence of two years and six months in prison.
Tseng is not allowed to appeal this decision.
Tseng did not attend yesterday's trial and -- ? as of press time yesterday -- had not said whether or not he would appeal.
In 2001, Taichung prosecutors discovered that Tseng had, in November 1998, abused his position as the president of the Taichung Business Bank to push through loans worth more than NT$9 billion.
In addition, the prosecutors discovered that Tseng had embezzled NT$9.2 billion from Shuntayu, another subsidiary that he had acquired in 1996.
In the meantime, Tseng also stole another NT$7.8 billion from his own Kuangsan Group and used the money for his personal investments in the stock market.
In the first instance, the Taichung District Court ruled that Tseng had used the embezzled money to purchase stock in Shuntayu in an attempt to boost the firm's share prices.
Tseng also required his employees -- including janitors -- to keep dummy accounts for his illicit financial endeavors.
The court blasted Tseng for masterminding the financial irregularities.
Although Tseng had ample funds to cover the stock purchase, Tseng reneged on the transaction, causing the 42 owners of the dummy accounts to face credit problems, debt and lawsuits.
During the initial trial by the Taichung District Court, these 42 co-defendants were given jail terms ranging between four months and 11 years.
However, the high court yesterday decided that these dummy account owners were innocent and cleared them of all charges.
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