Prosecutors today requested five entertainers be sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for evading mandatory military service, while indicting 12 people for similar offenses.
The five entertainers who prosecutors requested prison sentences for are actors Hsiu Chieh-kai (修杰楷) and Chen Bo-lin (陳柏霖), boyband Energy members Chang Shu-wei (張書偉) and Hsieh Kunda (謝坤達), and former boyband Lollipop member Leow Jun-jie (廖俊傑).
Photo: Taipei Times
As public figures, these five receive a lot of media attention and have considerable influence over public opinion, especially among the younger generation, prosecutors said.
However, they still deliberately evaded military service, rendering them unable to live up to society’s expectations and their responsibilities, prosecutors said.
Considering that their mandatory service period was one year and 10 months, prosecutors recommended that the court impose a prison sentence of two years and eight months.
The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office today also indicted 12 people, including a main suspect named Chen Chih-ming (陳志明), an accomplice surnamed Lee (李), the five entertainers and five others, for contravening the Punishment Act for Violation to Military Service System (妨害兵役治罪條例) and document forgery.
Prosecutors said that all five entertainers mentioned above paid Chen Chih-ming NT$100,000 to NT$300,000 for falsified medical reports exempting them from military service from 2010 to 2011.
Chen Chih-ming directed them to request service status re-examinations and falsify 24-hour blood pressure readings to show hypertension, which exempted them from service, the indictment said.
From 2011 to 2014, Chen Chih-ming and Lee helped five other men including one surnamed Ku (古) obtain similar service exemptions, collecting fees ranging from NT$100,000 to NT$220,000, prosecutors said.
Chen Chih-ming exploited loopholes in the system, instructing men to hold their breath to affect blood-pressure readings or arranging stand-ins to take the tests, prosecutors said.
As he recruited accomplices, enabling many men to evade military service, prosecutors asked the court to impose a heavy sentence of six years in prison.
For others indicted in this case for evading service, prosecutors recommended a one-year prison sentence for those whose mandatory service period was four months, and two-year, two-month prison sentences for those whose service period was one year.
Hsieh Kunda’s agent said, “we deeply regret our actions and would fully cooperate.”
Additional reporting by CNA
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