Taipei prosecutors yesterday indicted six police officers as well as five executives and staff from nightclubs in Taipei’s Zhongshan District (中山) in a probe into alleged corruption, where the officers are accused of taking bribes to protect a sex trade business.
The officers were charged with “taking bribes in breach of official duties” and related offenses, as well as contravening the Anti-Corruption Act (貪污治罪條例), the prosecutors said.
Superiors and officers at Taipei’s Zhongshan Police Precinct had allegedly been taking regular bribes from the area’s nightclubs and entertainment businesses from 2013 to 2018, when reports began to surface, prompting an investigation.
The prosecutors have said that the bribes totaled NT$5.56 million (US$198,856 at the current exchange rate).
They were allegedly collected from Tseng Hsiao-chi (曾小琪), the owner of Jialibao Group (嘉麗寶集團), and other proprietors.
Tseng, along with her sister, allegedly ran the Fair Lady, Charming and Givenchy nightclubs under the Jalibao Group in Taipei’s late-night entertainment area around Linsen N Road and Zhongshan N Road, which falls under the precinct’s jurisdiction.
Among the indicted officers is Tu Wei-lien (涂維廉), who was serving as deputy chief of Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) Police Station earlier this year when judicial investigators questioned him in connection with the case.
The other police officers who were charged were posted at the precinct when the alleged crime took place: Wu Yi-ming (吳翊銘), Chang Ning (張寧), Chen Yen-nan (陳彥安), Hsu Chun-ming (許峻銘) and Chen Chin-nan (陳錦男).
The remaining five indicted were nightclub operator Chiu Hsin-wei (邱信瑋), KTV parlor proprietor Hsiang Tong-yun (相同雲), nightclub accountant Wu Li-cheng (巫麗貞), and two other staff surnamed Chu (朱) and Chang (張). They have been accused of conducting the bribery scheme and acting as go-betweens, handing over the envelopes containing the bribe money to police.
Prosecutors had in February indicted two Taipei police officers, Lee Kung-hua (李功華) and Chen Chun-an (陳俊安), from the Zhongshan Precinct on charges of bribery and contraventions of the act.
“These police officers are receiving their salary from the government, but despite this, they had for many years solicited bribes from the area’s nightclub proprietors. They colluded with the proprietors by not carrying out proper checks during police sweeps,” the prosecutors said in a statement.
“In doing so, they have seriously undermined police authority and their duties, and tainted the public’s trust and respect for the police. During the investigation and while presenting evidence, they did not show remorse for their illegal activities. Therefore the judges are asked to impose severe punishments against the accused,” it said.
In exchange for taking bribes, the precinct’s officers allegedly shielded the nightclubs — which have been accused of offering sex services by female hostesses — from police sweeps and raids by other law-enforcement units, by giving advance warning to hide the hostesses and conceal the illicit activities, the prosecutors said.
The implicated police officers also allegedly filed falsified reports to their superiors to cover up the alleged sex trade at the nightclubs, they said.
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