Protesters yesterday gathered outside the Miaoli County District Court as the trial of six elderly individuals accused of slandering and defaming the county commissioner began.
The defendants, Liu Hsin-mei (劉新梅), Hsu Chu (許珠), Chang Tsung-chin (張宗欽), Tsai Jung-chih (蔡榮治), Chu Ming-kun (朱明崑) and Chen Pang-nan (陳邦男), who between them have lived about 400 years, were accused of defaming Miaoli County Commissioner Liu Cheng-hung (劉政鴻) by throwing joss paper around the commissioner’s residence. The six allegedly did so after attending a public memorial service for Chu Feng-min (朱逢敏), who committed suicide by drinking pesticide after her protests to the county government failed to halt a land expropriation project in 2010.
Tossing joss paper — paper money reserved for the dead — at a living person implies wishing them ill or that they would have a horrid death.
Photo: Fu Chao-piao, Taipei Times
Chu Feng-min was a landowner in Dapu Borough (大埔) whose farm was bulldozed by the county government in June 2010 to make way for an industrial park.
The county chief is suing the six defendants for NT$2 million (US$67,000) and demanding that they publish an apology in a newspaper.
However, the district court remanded Liu Cheng-hung’s slander lawsuit — a criminal offense — during the first trial, with Judge Tsai Chih-hung (蔡志宏) citing the passage “It is the nature of people to become attached to the land they live in and are unwilling to move from it,” from the Annals of Yuan Di (元帝記) in the History of the Western Han Dynasty (漢書) as proof that the expropriation of land has a deep impact on people.
The defendants had expressed their discontent over the Dapu incident, which falls within the constitutionally protected freedom of speech, Tsai Chih-hung said, adding that government officials should show more tolerance for such rhetoric and show the people the utmost understanding within reason.
Liu filed an appeal to overturn the court’s ruling.
The six defendants said they hoped “this bad soap opera won’t run on.”
“We already have a whole stack of summons served to us, and every time we have to go to court we have to travel so far. Please just let the poor people from Kaohsiung off the hook,” they said.
The six defendants said they tossed joss paper at Liu Cheng-hung’s residence to bid farewell to Chu Feng-min and that they did not have any intention to curse anyone.
They added that they hoped Liu Cheng-hung would be a considerate government official and withdraw his lawsuit.
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