Taiwan Civil Government founder Roger Lin (林志昇) and his wife, Julian Lin (林梓安), were yesterday indicted on additional charges of aggravated fraud and profiting on false pretenses, after 134 more people filed complaints against the couple and other executives of the organization.
Taoyuan prosecutors said that they had uncovered more evidence and took additional testimony from victims, after six top executives, including the Lins, were in July last year indicted on charges relating to money laundering, fraud, operating a criminal organization and illegal fundraising.
The six executives faced charges for allegedly defrauding Taiwan Civil Government members of about NT$770 million (US$24.48 million) by having them pay for political donations, seminars, “citizenship” identification cards and high-level membership fees for nonexistent government positions, among other schemes.
Photo: CNA
Roger Lin led the group, which “operated like a political Ponzi scheme,” prosecutors said, estimating that he and other leaders had made more than NT$1 billion since the organization was founded in 2008.
Roger Lin, 68, and Julian Lin, 52, are the main defendants in both indictments.
Additional charges were also filed against four executives who allegedly worked closely with the Lins: Yu Hsiang-ching (游象敬), 79, who owns the organization’s headquarters in Taoyuan; chief accounting officer Yeh Pi-lien (葉碧蓮), 54; Hsu Yi-ming (許義明), 67, who was named “finance minister” of the Taiwan Civil Government; and Tsai Tsai-yuan (蔡財源), 78, who was named “prime minister.”
Most of the 134 people who registered complaints and gave testimony said that they support the Taiwanese independence movement and agreed with Lin’s ideas.
The alleged victims said that their losses ranged from a few thousand to several million New Taiwan dollars.
Members were told that the “citizenship cards” issued by Roger Lin were authorized by the “US military government” and entitled holders to travel to or reside in the US, prosecutors said.
Roger Lin also claimed that the cards entitled holders to a one-to-one exchange rate between the NT dollar and US dollar; housing, healthcare and pensions paid for by the US government; and free tuition to a US college for their children, prosecutors said.
Taoyuan authorities in May last year raided the headquarters and residences of group executives, where they seized NT$134.43 million, US$50,000 and 2,000 euros (US$2,230 at the current exchange rate) in cash and discovered other assets belonging to Roger Lin, including deeds to four plots of land and four buildings.
After being detained for five months pending trial, the six suspects were in October last year released on bail with restrictions.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS