New Taipei City prosecutors have taken into custody five alleged gangsters — reportedly members of the Baoho Chapter of the Bamboo Union — regarding an investigation into a number of violent crimes in which illegal firearms were used, including the shooting of Internet celebrity Holger Chen (陳之漢).
Prosecutors and local police on Tuesday raided 14 locations, detaining Shao Po-chieh (邵柏傑), 44, reportedly a former boss of the chapter, and four others who allegedly worked under him.
The five suspects were yesterday transferred to the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office for questioning.
Photo: CNA, courtesy of a reader
Authorities in early October detained 10 people in connection with Chen’s case. They included Lin Hsiu-po (林修伯), the alleged boss of the chapter, as well as Liang Chih-sheng (梁智勝) and Shih Chun-chi (施俊吉).
One of their subordinates, Liu Cheng-hao (劉丞浩), 23, turned himself in to the police shortly afterward, saying that he had shot Chen in New Taipei City’s Linkou District (林口) in August.
Chen survived after being shot in the arm and leg outside a fitness center he founded.
Over the past few years, Lin and Liang had their subordinates, who were armed with firearms and other weapons, collect debts, as well as kidnap and extort people, among other violent crimes, prosecutors said.
Shao’s arrest was a major breakthrough, as prosecutors said that despite his claim that he had handed over the reigns to Lin, evidence pointed to Shao still being the real boss of the chapter.
Prosecutors said that he was the mastermind behind the plot to shoot Chen.
Following the October arrests, evidence pointed to the chapter’s leaders working with other crime syndicates and contacts in China to smuggle Chinese People’s Liberation (PLA) Army shotguns and other firearms into Taiwan, prosecutors said.
New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) at a news briefing yesterday praised the city’s police units that were involved in cracking down on the chapter.
“It was a good result by police and law enforcement agencies, as it has been more than three months since the Holger Chen shooting. The Bamboo Union gang’s Baoho Chapter was known as the most violent and most detested criminal ring active in the greater Taipei area,” Ho said.
“It is also among the most organized and closely knit criminal rings in Taiwan. They carried out kidnappings, extortion, armed robbery and murder, and they used weapons and handguns for these crimes,” he said.
“They had a conceited attitude when challenging the authorities, believing that they had superior firepower and were above the law,” Ho added.
He then thanked New Taipei City Police Chief Chen Che-wen (陳檡文) for assembling a task force to investigate crimes by the chapter, saying that its members put in many long hours of work.
“This week’s action was the third wave of search and arrests [involving] Baoho Chapter leaders and members believed to be responsible for the Holger Chen shooting... The police effort has also helped to allay public anxiety over the seemly prevalent use of firearms in these violent crimes in recent years,” Ho said.
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