Authorities in Changhua County yesterday arrested four people accused of running an underground election gambling ring and confiscating NT$1.19 million (US$38,137).
After receiving a tip-off, county prosecutors coordinated with police to surveil and raid three locations, arresting the primary suspects at their residences, Changhua County Deputy Chief Prosecutor Huang Shu-yuan (黃淑媛) said.
The suspects were offering odds and payouts for wagers on votes for presidential candidates, updating the odds based on the latest election news, Huang said.
Photo: Chen Kuan-bei, Taipei Times
“Their actions are quite damaging, affecting impartiality for holding a fair election,” she said.
The suspects face gambling charges under the Criminal Code and the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act (總統副總統選舉罷免法).
The suspects are a 62-year-old man surnamed Huang (黃), believed to be the leader of the operation, along with a man surnamed Peng (彭), 70, and two women, surnamed Yang (楊), 53, and Chen (陳), 45.
After questioning, Huang was released on bail of NT$100,000, while the other suspects were released on NT$30,000 bail.
The Ministry of Justice is providing a reward of NT$1 million for information leading to the arrest of underground betting rings with more than 40 members and with a betting pool of more than NT$1 million, the government announced earlier this month.
Informants could receive an additional NT$100,000 for every 10 percent increase in the number of members involved above 40 capped at NT$500,000.
Those reporting on an election gambling ring involving more than NT$5 million could receive an additional NT$50,000 for every additional NT$5 million in betting funds found, capped at NT$500,000.
People who report interference by foreign forces in the presidential election could receive a reward of up to NT$10 million. Informants would receive an additional NT$1 million for each additional person reported, up to a maximum of NT$20 million.
The Changhua County Prosecutors’ Office said that authorities would protect whistle-blowers’ identities in cases leading to arrests.
LOUD AND PROUD Taiwan might have taken a drubbing against Australia and Japan, but you might not know it from the enthusiasm and numbers of the fans Taiwan might not be expected to win the World Baseball Classic (WBC) but their fans are making their presence felt in Tokyo, with tens of thousands decked out in the team’s blue, blowing horns and singing songs. Taiwanese fans have packed out the Tokyo Dome for all three of their games so far and even threatened to drown out home team supporters when their team played Japan on Friday. They blew trumpets, chanted for their favorite players and had their own cheerleading squad who dance on a stage during the game. The team struggled to match that exuberance on the field, with
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. The single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, saber-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. A single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 800,000 to 400,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, sabre-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
RSS