The High Court yesterday revoked guilty verdicts against seven people involved in the occupation of the Executive Yuan during the 2014 Sunflower movement, as the charges against them have been dropped.
In April last year, the High Court sentenced the defendants to prison terms ranging from two to four months for inciting the occupation.
After an appeal, the Supreme Court in January remanded the cases to the High Court, saying that the defendants were exercising their “right of resistance,” or civil disobedience, as part of their freedom of expression.
The High Court yesterday said the role of the defendants in the occupation of the Executive Yuan complex had been redefined as assisting rather than inciting protesters, adding that the Executive Yuan had dropped its charges against the defendants and the cases have been closed.
The Sunflower movement was triggered by the then-ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) moving to fast-track a bill on a cross-strait services trade agreement with China.
During the protests from March 18 to April 10, hundreds of people broke into the Legislative Yuan, while thousands demonstrated outside the complex.
One group, which included the seven defendants, attempted to occupy the nearby Executive Yuan on March 23, but was forcibly removed by police wielding batons and firing water cannons during the early hours of March 24.
The defendants accused of inciting the Executive Yuan occupation were first tried in 2017 in the Taipei District Court, which acquitted them. Prosecutors appealed to the High Court, which last year overturned the lower court’s verdicts and found them guilty.
The High Court’s decision yesterday cannot be appealed.
EVA Airways today confirmed the death of a flight attendant on Saturday upon their return to Taiwan and said an internal investigation has been launched, as criticism mounted over a social media post accusing the airline of failing to offer sufficient employee protections. According to the post, the flight attendant complained of feeling sick on board a flight, but was unable to take sick leave or access medical care. The crew member allegedly did not receive assistance from the chief purser, who failed to heed their requests for medical attention or call an ambulance once the flight landed, the post said. As sick
A drunk woman was sexually assaulted inside a crowded concourse of Taipei Railway Station on Thursday last week before a foreign tourist notified police, leading to calls for better education on bystander intervention and review of security infrastructure. The man, surnamed Chiu (邱), was taken into custody on charges of sexual assault, taking advantage of the woman’s condition and public indecency. Police discovered that Chiu was a fugitive with prior convictions for vehicle theft. He has been taken into custody and is to complete his unserved six-month sentence, police said. On Thursday last week, Chiu was seen wearing a white
EVA Airways, one of the leading international carriers in Taiwan, yesterday said that it was investigating reports that a cabin crew manager had ignored the condition of a sick flight attendant, who died on Saturday. The airline made the statement in response to a post circulating on social media that said that the flight attendant on an outbound flight was feeling sick and notified the cabin crew manager. Although the flight attendant grew increasingly ill on the return flight, the manager did not contact Medlink — a system that connects the aircraft to doctors on the ground for treatment advice during medical
The Taichung District Court yesterday confirmed its final ruling that the marriage between teenage heir Lai (賴) and a man surnamed Hsia (夏) was legally invalid, preventing Hsia from inheriting Lai’s NT$500 million (US$16.37 million) estate. The court confirmed that Hsia chose not to appeal the civil judgement after the court handed down its ruling in June, making the decision final. In the June ruling, the court said that Lai, 18, and Hsia, 26, showed “no mutual admiration before the marriage” and that their interactions were “distant and unfamiliar.” The judge concluded that the couple lacked the “true intention of
RSS