Former national basketball team player Chien Chia-hung (簡嘉宏) was among 18 people taken into custody on Friday when police raided an alleged illegal gambling den at a residential building in New Taipei City’s Yonghe District (永和).
Chien was among 15 alleged gamblers apprehended during the raid, along with the three alleged proprietors of the establishment, which was running Texas hold’em poker and mahjong games in which people allegedly placed bets with money and poker chips.
Yonghe District Police Precinct officials said they confiscated poker chips valued at NT$8 million (US$238,799), bank drafts and checks valued at NT$2 million and NT$700,000 in cash.
Chien was playing poker, had exchanged NT$90,000 cash for poker chips and had lost about NT$50,000, police quoted him as saying.
Chien, 28, retired last year after playing for 10 years in the Super Basketball League.
He played center and was a key member of the powerhouse Pure Youth Construction team, which won the league championship title for four consecutive years between 2012 and last year.
He was a member of the Chinese Taipei national squad from 2010 to 2012.
A female croupier surnamed Liu (劉), 25, who was among those arrested, has received a lot of media attention, as she was allegedly hired by the proprietors to attract male clients to the establishment.
Police said Liu, along with the proprietor and a female accountant, are expected to be charged with gambling and related offenses.
The 15 gamblers violated the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法), were fined NT$3,000 and then released, officials said.
Pure Youth team manager Chang Cheng-chung (張承中) said he was surprised to hear about Chien’s alleged involvement in illegal gambling.
“If players who have contracts with Pure Youth are found gambling we would cancel their contract. We would also sue for damages to the team,” Chang said yesterday.
Taiwan was listed in 14th place among the world's wealthiest country in terms of GDP per capita, in the latest rankings released on Monday by Forbes magazine. Taiwan's GDP per capita was US$76,860, which put it at No. 14 on the list of the World's 100 Richest Countries this year, one spot above Hong Kong with US$75,130. The magazine's list of the richest countries in the world is compiled based on GDP per capita data, as estimated by the IMF. However, for a more precise measure of a nation's wealth, the magazine also considers purchasing power parity, which is a metric used to
Taiwan yesterday expelled four China Coast Guard vessels that entered Taiwan-controlled restricted waters off Lienchiang County (Matsu) shortly after the Chinese People’s Liberation Army announced the start of its “Joint Sword-2024B” drills around Taiwan. The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a statement that it had detected two China Coast Guard ships west of Nangan Island (南竿) and another two north of Dongyin Island (東引) at 8am yesterday. After Chinese ships sailed into restricted waters off Matsu shortly afterward, the CGA’s Kinmen-Matsu-Penghu Branch deployed four patrol vessels to shadow and approach the vessels, it said. The incidents pushed up to 44 the number
Renovations on the B3 concourse of Taipei Main Station are to begin on Nov. 1, with travelers advised to use entrances near the Taiwan Railway or high-speed rail platforms or information counter to access the MRT’s Red Line. Construction is to be completed before the end of next year, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said last week. To reduce the impact on travelers, the NT$95 million (US$2.95 million) project is to be completed in four stages, it said. In the first stage, the hall leading to the Blue Line near the art exhibition area is to be closed from Nov. 1 to the end
Taipei’s Ximending (西門町) shopping area welcomed the most international visitors, followed by Taipei 101, Songshan Cultural and Creative Park and Yangmingshan National Park (陽明山國家公園), a list of the city’s most popular tourist attractions published by the Taipei Department of Information and Tourism showed. As of August, 69.22 million people had visited Taipei’s main tourism spots, a 76 percent increase from 39.33 million in the same period last year, department data showed. Ximending had 20.21 million visitors, followed by Taipei 101 at 8.09 million, Songshan Cultural and Creative Park at 6.28 million, Yangmingshan at 4.51 million and the Red House Theater (西門紅樓) in
RSS