Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday clarified that the indictment of 21 of the 60 people accused in the death of a police detective murder in September, announced on Thursday, was not asking for the death penalty against the accused.
Rather, the court was being asked to impose “heavy punishment” (重刑) as permitted by the criminal code.
Thursday’s indictment announcement caused some misunderstanding when Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office spokesman Chang Chieh-chin (張介欽) said prosecutors have sought for “the most severe punishment” (極重之刑).
This statement was interpreted by some members of the public and the local media as a request for the death penalty.
However, an official clarification was made yesterday, after initial news reports of capital punishment being sought for the 21 suspects led to an uproar and expression of concern from civic organizations.
The total would have been the greatest number of people ever charged with the death penalty in one case by the nation’s judiciary.
“Seeking the most severe punishment might not necessarily mean the death penalty. It could be a life sentence, a 10-year term, or a five-year term, depending on the suspect’s charged offenses,” Chang said.
Chang said that he did use the words “seeking the most severe punishment,” but that it was an expression used to ask the court for heavy punishment to be imposed as set out in the criminal code, and was not meant to be assumed as a straightforward request for capital punishment.
A total of 60 suspects were indicted by prosecutors on charges of murder, assault causing death and other offenses in the fatal beating of off-duty police detective Hsueh Chen-kuo (薛貞國) outside the ATT 4 FUN department store in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) in September.
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