The Supreme Court on Monday last week upheld a decision to sentence two former police officers to prison terms of at least eight years for demanding or taking bribes from migrant workers.
The case originally involved three ex-officers, but one was later given a reduced sentence while the remaining two appealed their guilty verdicts, which resulted in the Supreme Court’s ruling.
From October 2012 to August 2014, the men, who were stationed at the Taipei Police Department’s Datong Precinct, took cash and gold necklaces from migrant workers who had absconded from their jobs in exchange for not handing them over to the National Immigration Agency, the court said.
Photo: Wu Cheng-feng, Taipei Times
Former officer Lin Chang-ling (林長玲) took and demanded bribes valued at NT$79,000 from 2012 to 2014, while former officers Lin Yi-hui (林奕輝) and Tsai Chih-wei (蔡志偉) took bribes totaling NT$33,000, the court said.
Their case was first heard by the Taipei District Court, which in March 2017 sentenced Lin Chang-ling to 10 years in prison, Tsai to nine years and four months, and Lin Yi-hui to four years.
Lin Chang-ling was found guilty of forced seizure of workers’ property in addition to demanding and taking bribes, and Tsai’s sentence was based on him demanding bribes in addition to taking them.
Following an appeal, the Taiwan High Court in March 2019 upheld the sentences for Lin Chang-ling and Tsai, while reducing Lin Yi-hui’s sentence to three years and four months.
The case was then sent to the Supreme Court, which in December 2019 remanded it to the High Court due to a lack of evidence showing that Lin Chang-ling had extorted migrants and seized their property, and that Tsai had demanded bribes.
In a retrial in December last year, the High Court sentenced Lin Chang-ling to nine years and two months in prison after finding him guilty of contravening the Anti-Corruption Act (貪污治罪條例), and sentenced Tsai to eight years.
Lin Yi-hui’s sentence was reduced to 24 months and he was granted probation, as he had admitted to wrongdoing and donated NT$1,500 each month to the Taiwan International Workers’ Association between June 2017 and November last year, which showed that he had repented and sought to compensate for his actions, the High Court said.
Lin Chang-ling and Tsai appealed the ruling, resulting in the latest verdict.
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