A reporter and professor were sentenced to nine and six months in prison respectively and stripped of their civil rights for two years by the Taichung branch of the High Court today for fabricating election polls during the last presidential election.
Reporter Lin Hsien-yuan (林獻元) allegedly accepted 130,000 yuan (US$17,936) from the Chinese Communist Party and worked with Taichung-based Tunghai University professor Su Yuan-hwa (蘇雲華) to disseminate fake polls that would influence election results.
The dissemination of fake opinion polls misleads voters and endangers the nation’s sovereignty and democracy, prosecutors said, accusing Lin and Su of contravening the Anti-infiltration Act (反滲透法).
Photo: Chang Jui-chen, Taipei Times
The Taichung District Court ruled this law did not apply, and instead sentenced Lin and Su to eight and four months in prison respectively for contravening the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act (總統副總統選罷法).
The prosecution was dissatisfied with this ruling and appealed.
The Taichung branch of the High Court issued a second ruling today, stating that the defendants contravened both acts and increased their sentences.
The High Court also granted Su a two-year probation.
It did not provide additional reasoning for the ruling, which can be appealed.
Prosecutors initially accused the defendants of following instructions from China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman Chen Binhua (陳斌華) to publish nine false presidential election polls.
In the first trial by the district court, Su admitted to the crimes, while Lin said that his manipulation of polling data was not politically motivated and that the money he received was for purchasing teapots on behalf of his Chinese friends.
As Lin had been engaged in cross-strait journalism for a long period, the court ruled that interactions with Chinese reporters and officials were understandable and did not indicate he was following their commands.
The false polls released before Nov. 24, 2023, were deemed not punishable, as candidates had not yet registered at that time.
The two polls fabricated after that date were ruled to have contravened the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act.
The district court also ruled that Lin contravened the Company Act (公司法) by borrowing money from a friend to meet the minimum capital threshold required to found his media company.
The High Court maintained this ruling.
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