Lawyers for Pharmally International Holding Co yesterday filed lawsuits against two Deloitte & Touche Taiwan auditors for breach of trust and submitting false financial reports.
Pharmally executives are being probed over alleged securities fraud totaling about NT$1.5 billion (US$50.82 million).
Authorities last week issued an international warrant for Pharmally chairman Huang Wen-lai (黃文烈), also known as Tony Huang, over an alleged illegal transfer of NT$700 million into his personal bank accounts.
Investigators accused Huang of colluding with Chinese businesspeople to falsify accounts and financial statements in one of the largest securities fraud cases in the past few years involving a Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE)-listed firm.
Prosecutors on Thursday last week conducted raids and questioned 14 people, including the two auditors, Benjamin Shih (施景彬) and Allen Chiang (江明南), who were in charge of Pharmally’s reports.
Shih and Chiang were released on bail of NT$300,000 each.
Phamally lawyers yesterday said that Shih, a certified public accountant, was chief operating officer of Deloitte & Touche Taiwan and headed its auditing section, handling Pharmally’s reports since 2011, while Chiang started work on Pharmally finances in 2015.
The lawyers said that Shih and Chiang contravened the Securities and Exchange Act (證券交易法) by “making false statements in a financial report” as a managerial officer or accounting officer who signs or seals a report.
The pair violated the rights of Pharmally’s shareholders, causing them to incur financial losses, the lawyers said, adding that they would press charges of aggravated breach of trust, which, if proved would add to their punishment.
Shih and Chiang billed Pharmally more than NT$9 million per year, a much higher rate than other accounting firms, the lawyers said, citing a NT$6 million bill from E.Sun Financial Holding.
The TWSE on Tuesday last week suspended trading on Pharmally shares.
Pharmally has production sites in China’s Anhui Province and offices in several Chinese cities.
Its founding Chaoyang Chemical Plant in China in 1997 was restructured as Anhui Chaoyang Pharmaceutical Co.
Huang, a native of Miaoli County, bought Anhui Chaoyang and set up Pharmally in China in 2013.
Pharmally gained approval to list on the TWSE in March 2015 under the KY stock category for foreign-based firms.
The lawyers said that Shih and Chiang handled other KY stocks, so they were familiar with the auditing processes, including checking finances, assets, liquidity, debts and other details.
Taiwan does not exclude the possibility of having formal diplomatic relations with countries that also have formal ties with China, regardless of Beijing’s stance, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Sunday. There was speculation in 2012 that Honduras was attempting to have simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taiwan and China, an idea that then-minister of foreign affairs David Lin (林永樂) rejected. Honduras severed formal ties with Taiwan on Sunday morning after establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing. President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration has taken a more practical approach to relations with like-minded countries since assuming government in 2016. Previous administrations took the
WASHED ASHORE: Of the 16 bodies discovered along Taiwan’s west coast this month, two were Vietnamese and five were Taiwanese, coast guard officials said Minister of Justice Tsai Ching-hsiang (蔡清祥) said that he has instructed prosecutors and maritime authorities to launch investigations after 16 bodies were found along Taiwan’s west coast this month, amid speculation that they were victims of smuggling or human trafficking rings. Coast Guard Administration (CGA) officials said the bodies, most of which had washed ashore, were found by coast guard personnel and local residents along the coastline from Keelung to Kaohsiung. Thirteen of the bodies are male and three are female, the CGA said, adding that items found on the bodies indicate that two of the men were Vietnamese, while three men
TASK FORCE DISPATCHED: MOFA said it would assist state employees with repatriation or relocation to other ally nations in the region after Tegucigalpa severed ties The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) on Monday ordered Honduras to vacate its embassy in Taiwan within 30 days of Sunday after Tegucigalpa made a similar demand of Taiwan. Taipei on Monday announced that it had cut ties with Honduras after the Central American nation earlier said in a statement that it had established ties with Beijing and ended its diplomatic relationship with Taiwan. Following the announcements, Honduran Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Antonio Garcia spoke on Honduran television saying that Taiwan would be required to vacate its embassy in the Honduran capital. In Taipei, MOFA later told a news conference that “according
CHINA TRIP: The former president said he hoped the two sides of the Taiwan Strait would work together to pursue peace, avoid war and strive to ‘revitalize China’ Former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday began a 12-day tour of China with a visit to the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum in Nanjing. He paid tribute to Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙), a founder of the Republic of China, giving a short speech and then bowing in front of the memorial. “The people of both sides of the Taiwan Strait belong to the Chinese nation, are children of Yandi (炎帝) and Huangdi (黃帝),” he told reporters who had been allowed to follow him on the trip, referring to figures said to have founded of the Han ethnicity in ancient China. Ma has framed the trip as
RSS