A man penalized for breaching COVID-19 quarantine regulations has had his fine revoked after it emerged that he had been kidnapped by debt collectors.
The man, surnamed Chen (陳), returned from Hong Kong in late October last year and began his 14 days of mandatory home quarantine at a friend’s home in Nantou County.
However, the following day, men identified as debt collectors arrived at the home and reportedly mistook Chen for his friend, who owed them money.
The men assaulted Chen, abducted him and took him to his own home to collect the money owed, the Ministry of Justice said last week.
He was then returned to the residence where he had been in quarantine.
It was not clear how police were alerted that he had left, but the government’s quarantine system includes electronic monitoring through cellphone signals.
Chen was arrested and fined NT$100,000 for breaching the regulations.
Chen’s explanation was investigated and confirmed, the ministry said, adding that his fine was revoked because he was forced to leave quarantine against his will.
“The breach of the quarantine regulations was not caused by his own intentional or negligent behavior,” said Hu Tian-ci (胡天賜), a spokesman for the ministry’s Changhua branch. “According to the law, such behavior should not be punished and should be referred to the health unit for withdrawal.”
It is the first time that a government fine for a quarantine breach has been reversed.
The maximum fine for breaching the regulations is NT$300,000.
It was imposed last month on a pilot who flew between Taiwan and the US, but traveled around Taipei while infectious, leading to the first locally transmitted case in more than 250 days.
Costa Rica sent a group of intelligence officials to Taiwan for a short-term training program, the first time the Central American country has done so since the countries ended official diplomatic relations in 2007, a Costa Rican media outlet reported last week. Five officials from the Costa Rican Directorate of Intelligence and Security last month spent 23 days in Taipei undergoing a series of training sessions focused on national security, La Nacion reported on Friday, quoting unnamed sources. The Costa Rican government has not confirmed the report. The Chinese embassy in Costa Rica protested the news, saying in a statement issued the same
Taiwan’s Liu Ming-i, right, who also goes by the name Ray Liu, poses with a Chinese Taipei flag after winning the gold medal in the men’s physique 170cm competition at the International Fitness and Bodybuilding Federation Asian Championship in Ajman, United Arab Emirates, yesterday.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
RSS