Chiayi County Councilor Tsai Cheng-yi (蔡政宜), who is being questioned in a money laundering case, was placed in pretrial detention on Tuesday after he was arrested attempting to board an international flight.
Tsai, who is also known as the “Windshield Wiper” (雨刷) and was convicted in the 2009 baseball game-fixing scandal, was arrested on Sunday at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport attempting to board a flight to Vietnam. Following a hearing on Tuesday, he was placed in pretrial detention to prevent him from fleeing the country.
Prosecutors have said that Tsai heads a criminal organization that assists in money transfers and money laundering for international gambling and casino operators, and is estimated to have handled up to NT$20 billion (US$650.9 million) over the past four years.
Photo: Tsai Ching-hua, Taipei Times
Kaohsiung’s Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday said that an investigation found that Tsai owns a more than NT$100 million residence in Kaohsiung’s harbor-front area, as well as several other properties and high-worth assets.
Prosecutors said they have sufficient evidence, including witness testimony, to charge Tsai under the Organized Crime Prevention Act (組織犯罪防制條例) and the Money Laundering Control Act (洗錢防制法) for allegedly laundering more than NT$100 million and on aggravated offenses of money laundering.
News reports said that investigators raided a money laundering operation in Kaohsiung, arresting several suspects, and gathering evidence and testimony implicating Tsai as the main backer of the group.
Investigators found several money transfer and laundering operations in Kaohsiung and other cities that included computers and telecom systems for international remittance and money laundering, prosecutors said, adding that Tsai allegedly worked with online casino sites and gambling businesses run by crime networks in Vietnam and Cambodia.
Prosecutors said that Tsai allegedly employed a “hit-and-run” strategy, housing an operation in a luxury commercial building for a few months before relocating to prevent authorities from tracking the money laundering.
Tsai allegedly instructed employees to operate online banking and transaction services, linking up with offshore entities to send illegal gambling proceeds to dummy accounts, where the funds were converted to cryptocurrencies, mainly ether, making it more difficult to trace transactions, prosecutors said.
Tsai, who is not affiliated with a party, was elected to the Chiayi County Council from Dongshih Township (東石) in the 2022 nine-in-one elections.
He was arrested in 2009 for his involvement as the alleged mastermind of an underground betting ring in which he and intermediaries bribed baseball players to fix games from 2006 to 2009. He was sentenced to three years and eight months in prison, and was released in 2016.
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