Supporters and opponents of the death penalty made their arguments for and against the practice yesterday at a hearing organized by the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) in Taipei County.
Panelist Bill Hsu (許福生), a law professor at Central Police University, said the death penalty should be maintained.
“I spent plenty of time interviewing Chen Chin-hsing (陳進興) in prison ... learning why people like him should be separated from society forever,” he said.
Chen, who abducted and murdered TV hostess Pai Ping-ping’s (白冰冰) 17-year-old daughter Pai Hsiao-yen (白曉燕) in 1997, was convicted of kidnapping and other charges in January 1998 and executed the following year.
Academia Sinica research fellow Chiu Hei-yuan (瞿海源) said President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), Minister of Justice Tseng Yung-fu (曾勇夫) and Prosecutor-General Huang Shih-ming (黃世銘) all said abolition of the death penalty was the nation’s long-term goal, but because public opinion supports continuing executions, the government would not abolish the death penalty for now.
Chiu said public opinion was only an excuse, as the government is reluctant to push its own policy.
Public opinion is dynamic and complicated, he said, adding that polls have shown that 53 percent of the public support replacing executions with life imprisonment without parole, while 60 percent support people on death row not being executed if they reflect upon and regret their crime.
Attorney Hsu Wen-bin (許文彬) said opponents say that although abolition of the death penalty is an international trend and reflects progress in human rights, countries have different values and we do not have to take into account what other countries think because Taiwanese support retaining the death penalty.
Attorney and executive director of the Judicial Reform Foundation Lin Feng-jeng (林峰正) said the death penalty has to be abolished because of incorrect verdicts.
Amnesty International statistics show 130 people were wrongly executed in the US since 1980.
National Chiao Tung University law professor Carol Lin (林志潔) said life imprisonment without parole is more inhumane than execution because it is against human nature for people to live in a confined space.
National Taiwan University law professor Lee Mau-sheng (李茂生) said using the death penalty to maintain social order or deter violent crimes are illusions because since Taiwan began handing down fewer death sentences and not executing people, violent crime has not increased.
Most people at the hearing, however, supported the death penalty.
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to
LOOKING NORTH: The base would enhance the military’s awareness of activities in the Bashi Channel, which China Coast Guard ships have been frequenting, an expert said The Philippine Navy on Thursday last week inaugurated a forward operating base in the country’s northern most province of Batanes, which at 185km from Taiwan would be strategically important in a military conflict in the Taiwan Strait. The Philippine Daily Inquirer quoted Northern Luzon Command Commander Lieutenant General Fernyl Buca as saying that the base in Mahatao would bolster the country’s northern defenses and response capabilities. The base is also a response to the “irregular presence this month of armed” of China Coast Guard vessels frequenting the Bashi Channel in the Luzon Strait just south of Taiwan, the paper reported, citing a
A total lunar eclipse, an astronomical event often referred to as a “blood moon,” would be visible to sky watchers in Taiwan starting just before midnight on Sunday night, the Taipei Astronomical Museum said. The phenomenon is also called “blood moon” due to the reddish-orange hue it takes on as the Earth passes directly between the sun and the moon, completely blocking direct sunlight from reaching the lunar surface. The only light is refracted by the Earth’s atmosphere, and its red wavelengths are bent toward the moon, illuminating it in a dramatic crimson light. Describing the event as the most important astronomical phenomenon
BETTER SERVICE QUALITY: From Nov. 10, tickets with reserved seats would only be valid for the date, train and route specified on the ticket, THSRC said Starting on Nov. 10, high-speed rail passengers with reserved seats would be required to exchange their tickets to board an earlier train. Passengers with reserved seats on a specific train are currently allowed to board earlier trains on the same day and sit in non-reserved cars, but as this is happening increasingly often, and affecting quality of travel and ticket sales, Taiwan High-Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) announced that it would be canceling the policy on Nov. 10. It is one of several new measures launched by THSRC chairman Shih Che (史哲) to improve the quality of service, it said. The company also said
RSS