Prosecutors said yesterday that evidence might show that the director-general of the Financial Supervisory Commission's Examination Bureau, Lee Chin-chen (李進誠), had asked a suspect, Lin Ming-da (林明達), to illegally buy and borrow shares of some companies on his behalf from the stock market.
"Lee should leave his position as prosecutors investigate whether he was actually involved in the stock market scandal," said Hou Kuan-jen (侯寬仁), a prosecutor in charge of the case at the Black Gold Investigation Center of the Taiwan High Court Prosecutors' Office.
"As the director-general of the commission's Examination Bureau, Lee has the right to see documents that are under investigation by prosecutors, so I suggested Lee should at least temporarily leave the position," Hou added.
Premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) yesterday said he supported the investigation of the scandal because the country needs a clean Financial Supervisory Commission.
On June 23, prosecutors raided the office and residence of Lin Ming-da (林明達), a private individual investor allegedly in charge of the illegal trading. Prosecutors were shocked to find Lee's business card and a note at Lin's office allegedly written by Lee, asking Lin to borrow money against Power Quotient's shares on his behalf.
The note also contained Lee's bank account details, and a list of shares of several companies under investigation by the Examination Bureau which Lee asked Lin to trade on his behalf.
Lee yesterday admitted he knew Lin, but he denied delivering any notes to him. The Taipei Prosecutors' Office in January investigated Power Quotient International Co's (勁永國際) inflated revenue figures for last year. While prosecutors were launching several new investigations, Lin borrowed money in advance against Power Quotient International Co, and made substantial profits. Prosecutors suspected that officials in the commission's Examination Bureau and agents of the Investigation Bureau might have been leaking the information to Lin and specific reporters, and were involved in illegal trading. When they found the suspicious note written by Lee on June 23, they decided to launch an investigation against him.
Prosecutors said they were probing Lee's phone records and whether he had been in touch with persons involved in illegal trading in recent months.
Chinese-language newspapers yesterday said not only Lee, but other high-ranking officials in the Ministry of Justice's Investigation Bureau (MJIB) and the Financial Supervisory Commission were suspected of involvement in illegal trading. Lee was appointed to the position in January.
The Black Gold Investigation Center had said that there was a group illegally profiting from stock movements. The group allegedly consisted of agents from the MJIB, a couple of reporters and individual investors. The prosecutors had said that some agents aroused suspicion by leaking the results of their investigations to specific reporters. By the time the stories were published, the individual investors had already borrowed substantial amounts of money from or bought shares of companies under investigation. The members of the group then shared the illegal profits.
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FSC's Lee denies connection to trading scandal
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