Former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) son, Chen Chih-chung (陳致中), and daughter-in-law, Huang Jui-ching (黃睿靚), will plead guilty on Tuesday to all charges against them, their lawyer said yesterday.
Taipei District Court Judge Tsai Shou-hsun (蔡守訓) summoned Chen Chih-chung and his wife, among others, to appear in court on Tuesday to hear both sides’ arguments on whether they would enter plea negotiations.
Unconfirmed rumors have circulated in the media that because the couple had been unable to wire back the family’s overseas funds, they would not be able to enter plea negotiations with the prosecution and therefore face heavier sentences.
Attorney Yeh Ta-hui (葉大慧) said Chen Chih-chung and Huang would plead guilty to the charges against them on Tuesday and would request a reduced sentence.
Yeh said the couple had cooperated fully with prosecutors and had no wish to delay the legal proceedings.
Chen Chih-chung and his wife, who are facing charges relating to the former president’s corruption trial, had promised to wire about NT$1.2 billion (US$36.6 million) from Swiss accounts and paper companies back to Taiwan as part of conditions to enter plea-bargaining.
However, none of the money has been remitted because Swiss authorities froze the funds based on the two countries’ judicial mutual assistance agreement. Taiwanese prosecutors are in the process of requesting that the money be unfrozen and wired back.
Taipei on Thursday held urban resilience air raid drills, with residents in one of the exercises’ three “key verification zones” reporting little to no difference compared with previous years, despite government pledges of stricter enforcement. Formerly known as the Wanan exercise, the air raid drills, which concluded yesterday, are now part of the “Urban Resilience Exercise,” which also incorporates the Minan disaster prevention and rescue exercise. In Taipei, the designated key verification zones — where the government said more stringent measures would be enforced — were Songshan (松山), Zhongshan (中山) and Zhongzheng (中正) districts. Air raid sirens sounded at 1:30pm, signaling the
The number of people who reported a same-sex spouse on their income tax increased 1.5-fold from 2020 to 2023, while the overall proportion of taxpayers reporting a spouse decreased by 4.4 percent from 2014 to 2023, Ministry of Finance data showed yesterday. The number of people reporting a spouse on their income tax trended upward from 2014 to 2019, the Department of Statistics said. However, the number decreased in 2020 and 2021, likely due to a drop in marriages during the COVID-19 pandemic and the income of some households falling below the taxable threshold, it said. The number of spousal tax filings rebounded
A saleswoman, surnamed Chen (陳), earlier this month was handed an 18-month prison term for embezzling more than 2,000 pairs of shoes while working at a department store in Tainan. The Tainan District Court convicted Chen of embezzlement in a ruling on July 7, sentencing her to prison for illegally profiting NT$7.32 million (US$248,929) at the expense of her employer. Chen was also given the opportunity to reach a financial settlement, but she declined. Chen was responsible for the sales counter of Nike shoes at Tainan’s Shinkong Mitsukoshi Zhongshan branch, where she had been employed since October 2019. She had previously worked
‘NON-RED’: Taiwan and Ireland should work together to foster a values-driven, democratic economic system, leveraging their complementary industries, Lai said President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday expressed hopes for closer ties between Taiwan and Ireland, and that both countries could collaborate to create a values-driven, democracy-centered economic system. He made the remarks while meeting with an Irish cross-party parliamentary delegation visiting Taiwan. The delegation, led by John McGuinness, deputy speaker of the Irish house of representatives, known as the Dail, includes Irish lawmakers Malcolm Byrne, Barry Ward, Ken O’Flynn and Teresa Costello. McGuinness, who chairs the Ireland-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Association, is a friend of Taiwan, and under his leadership, the association’s influence has grown over the past few years, Lai said. Ireland is
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