The death penalty was upheld this morning for a man convicted of raping and killing a Malaysian university student in 2020, the first such sentencing since the Constitutional Court’s ruling last year that the death penalty should only be used in the most extreme cases.
The ruling was revisited today by the High Court’s Kaohsiung branch via video conference after aspects of its previous verdict was overturned by the Supreme Court.
The court found that the case did not meet the conditions required of the Constitutional Court ruling from September last year, determining that Liang Yu-chih (梁育誌) would still be sentenced to death.
Photo: Wu Chun-feng, Taipei Times
The case has already been referred for appeal as required by law.
Lee Shu-hui (李淑惠), administrative head of the Kaohsiung branch of the High Court, gave three reasons for the ruling.
First, Lee said that the crime was premeditated for a considerable length of time.
Second, the cruelty and maliciousness of the crime meet the criteria of the “most serious circumstances” as required by the Constitutional Court ruling, Lee said.
Third, Liang found himself in financial hardship and had stated he wanted to “experience something thrilling so he would die with no regrets,” she added.
The court also found that Liang had antisocial personality disorder, which was unresponsive to treatment, and was at high risk of reoffending, especially for sexual assault, rendering him unsuitable for rehabilitation, she said.
In the first and second trials, the Ciaotou District Court and the Kaohsiung branch of the High Court sentenced Liang to death for crimes including attempted forcible sexual intercourse, forcible sexual intercourse, robbery homicide, intentional homicide and abandonment of a body.
The Supreme Court then overturned aspects of the second conviction, saying that the charge of abandoning a body was confirmed, but the sexual assault and murder charges should be retried.
Liang’s legal team had argued that the murder was not intentional, while the Supreme Court cited insufficient investigation in proving all aspects of the crime were premeditated.
The court also requested that the risk of reoffending be reassessed.
The case dates back to Oct. 28, 2020, when Liang attacked a Malaysian student walking alone through an underpass.
He used rope to tie her neck before raping her, strangling her to death and dumping her body on Dagangshan (大崗山) in Kaohsiung's Alian District (阿蓮).
Liang, who is from Alian, found the dimly lit area a 10-minute drive from his house in Tainan’s Guiren District (歸仁), where students from Chang Jung Christian University often passed by, the court found.
According to the court’s findings, Liang used a rope to strangle the woman, tying it in such a way that required both hands and considerable strength, before applying force greater than 15kg to crush the victim's jugular, carotid artery and trachea, and damaging her vocal cords, all of which constitutes intentional murder with significant force.
Moreover, the court found that Liang had inserted an unknown cylindrical object into the victim’s vagina, which forced air into her uterus causing an embolism in her heart and severe bleeding in her vagina and bladder, actions that were extreme and malicious, and justified the death sentence.
Additional reporting by CNA
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