The New Taipei District Court yesterday approved an arrest warrant for a man who skipped bail while under indictment for allegedly marketing counterfeit Rosuvastatin (also known as Crestor), a cholesterol-reducing drug.
Pan Chun-ta (潘駿達), 40, on Thursday failed to appear for a trial hearing and did not report to police, prosecutors said.
Pan allegedly made about NT$69 million (US$2.3 million) over two years by making and selling counterfeit versions of the drug, prosecutors said.
Pan colluded with three others to import materials from China to produce counterfeit Rosuvastatin at a facility in New Taipei City’s Sijhih District (汐止) starting in 2015, they said.
After being charged with contravening the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act (藥事法), he was in February released on NT$1 million bail.
Bailiffs on Thursday inquired into Pan’s whereabouts and found that he had failed to report to Sijhih police once a month.
The case was the second this month in which a local police unit failed to alert judicial authorities about a suspect breaking the terms of their bail agreement.
Earlier this month, Ching Fu Shipbuilding Co vice chairman Chen Wei-chih (陳偉志) failed to appear for trial and is suspected of having fled Taiwan to evade prosecution.
Chen’s father, company chairman Chen Ching-nan (陳慶男), was later detained after failing to pay his NT$100 million bail.
Prosecutors have charged the Chens with fraud, breaches of trust and contravening the Banking Act (銀行法) by using forged documents to obtain a NT$20.5 billion syndicated loan from nine domestic lenders in 2016.
Chen Wei-chih was ordered to report daily to Kaohsiung police, but he had not done so since May 5, city court officials said.
Prosecutors in New Taipei City and Kaohsiung said they would investigate to determine if local police were negligent or colluded with the defendants.
Organizing one national referendum and 26 recall elections targeting Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators could cost NT$1.62 billion (US$55.38 million), the Central Election Commission said yesterday. The cost of each recall vote ranges from NT$16 million to NT$20 million, while that of a national referendum is NT$1.1 billion, the commission said. Based on the higher estimate of NT$20 million per recall vote, if all 26 confirmed recall votes against KMT legislators are taken into consideration, along with the national referendum on restarting the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant, the total could be as much as NT$1.62 billion, it said. The commission previously announced
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday welcomed NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s remarks that the organization’s cooperation with Indo-Pacific partners must be deepened to deter potential threats from China and Russia. Rutte on Wednesday in Berlin met German Chancellor Friedrich Merz ahead of a ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of Germany’s accession to NATO. He told a post-meeting news conference that China is rapidly building up its armed forces, and the number of vessels in its navy outnumbers those of the US Navy. “They will have another 100 ships sailing by 2030. They now have 1,000 nuclear warheads,” Rutte said, adding that such
Tropical Storm Nari is not a threat to Taiwan, based on its positioning and trajectory, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Nari has strengthened from a tropical depression that was positioned south of Japan, it said. The eye of the storm is about 2,100km east of Taipei, with a north-northeast trajectory moving toward the eastern seaboard of Japan, CWA data showed. Based on its current path, the storm would not affect Taiwan, the agency said.
The cosponsors of a new US sanctions package targeting Russia on Thursday briefed European allies and Ukraine on the legislation and said the legislation would also have a deterrent effect on China and curb its ambitions regarding Taiwan. The bill backed by US senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal calls for a 500 percent tariff on goods imported from countries that buy Russian oil, gas, uranium and other exports — targeting nations such as China and India, which account for about 70 percent of Russia’s energy trade, the bankroll of much of its war effort. Graham and Blumenthal told The Associated Press
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