Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City Councilor Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) allegedly visited upscale hostess bars earlier this month, reports said yesterday.
Liang, who has been married for 10 years, was seen leaving a bar with a young woman, with the two acting intimately toward each other before entering an apartment building together, Next Magazine reported.
Liang, who has been in a doctoral program at the London School of Economics and Political Science and is married to TV news anchor Michelle Lin (林楚茵), has a decent and professional public image, the report said.
Liang visited upscale hostess bars at least six times from June 8 to Wednesday last week, at an estimated total cost of at least NT$100,000, it added.
The magazine released a video purportedly recorded late on June 9 showing Liang leaving the Cheeky Girl Piano Bar in Taipei with a young woman in a miniskirt and high heels, with the two getting into a taxi together.
The video shows the two sitting close to each other in the taxi, with the woman putting her hand on Liang’s buttocks and into a pocket in his pants as they stand on the sidewalk after getting out of the vehicle.
They then enter an apartment building together, it shows.
Liang yesterday said that he has made many friends as a city councilor, and they sometimes invite him to such bars.
He would “go to greet them and sit for a while,” Liang said, denying that the woman in the video was a hostess.
Liang said that the woman is a friend’s girlfriend, and that his wife knows her.
“As we have known each other for a long time, we are used to fooling around,” he said. “However, as a public figure, I will be more critical of my own behavior.”
Liang said Lin knows about the incident, because he always reports his activities to his wife.
‘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
FINAL COUNTDOWN: About 50,000 attended a pro-recall rally yesterday, while the KMT and the TPP plan to rally against the recall votes today Democracy activists, together with arts and education representatives, yesterday organized a motorcade, while thousands gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei in the evening in support of tomorrow’s recall votes. Recall votes for 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers and suspended Hsinchu City mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) are to be held tomorrow, while recall votes for seven other KMT lawmakers are scheduled for Aug. 23. The afternoon motorcade was led by the Spring Breeze Culture and Arts Foundation, the Tyzen Hsiao Foundation and the Friends of Lee Teng-hui Association, and was joined by delegates from the Taiwan Statebuilding Party and the Taiwan Solidarity
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
The Taipei District Court today ruled to extend the incommunicado detention of former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) and Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇) for two more months as part of an ongoing corruption trial. Codefendants in the case — real-estate tycoon Sheen Ching-jing (沈慶京) and Ko's former mayoral office head Lee Wen-tsung (李文宗) — were granted bail of NT$100 million (US$3.4 million) and NT$20 million respectively. Sheen and Lee would also be barred from leaving the country for eight months and prohibited from contact with, harassing, threatening or inquiring after the case with codefendants or witnesses. The two would also be