Hualien police were yesterday looking for a missing couple whose five children were found dead at their Hualien home on Friday night.
Police suspect the five were murdered by their father Liu Chih-chin (
Liu's car was was found by police yesterday parked near the Chian Township (
The five deceased include Liu's 18-year-old and 17-year-old sons -- children from Liu's previous marriage -- and three daughters aged 12, 9 and 8 from his current marriage to Lin.
"The five corpses were found at a bathroom in their house. Their hands and legs were all tied with wire, and their facial features were sealed with adhesive tape, and their heads were covered with plastic bags," police officer Lin Chien-lung (
As there were no signs of fighting in the house, police suspect the five were already unconscious before they were smothered, added officer Lin.
The windows and the door of the bathroom were sealed with adhesive tape, officer Lin said.
The officer said it appeared the five had been dead for three days.
Officer Lin said Liu's wife Lin talked with the children's teachers by telephone on Wednesday and asked them to be excused from class due to illness.
Hualien District Prosecutors' Office spokeswoman Huang Yi-chun (
Liu was suspected of having debts of around NT$3 million (US$91,254), which may have led to the incident, officer Lin said.
Police suspect Liu and Lin might have left their home and committed suicide outside after killing their children.
Police also suspect the murder might have involved Liu's creditors, officer Lin added.
Police discovered the murder on Friday evening, after neighbors detected a bad smell emanating from house.
The neighbors told police nothing peculiar had happened before the incident.
Lin said that Liu ran a tourist photography business in Hualien.
Police suspect that Liu went heavily into debt to expand his business, which led to serious financial difficulties for the family.
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
RSS