A man was detained for assault and stalking after he allegedly followed an 18-year-old girl home from school yesterday afternoon and then violently attacked her 72-year-old grandmother and a 69-year-old borough warden when they came to her aid, the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said.
The New Taipei District Court last night approved the suspect’s detention without visitation rights.
Both the grandmother and Xinyi Village (信義里) Borough Warden Guo Teng-fang (郭騰芳) were hospitalized due to their injuries, prosecutors said.
Photo: Taipei Times file photo
The grandmother had a fractured nose, injuries to both eyes and a ruptured liver, while Guo had a laceration on his right eyelid and a severed tear duct in his right eye, they said.
The 41-year-old suspect, surnamed You (游), has committed eight sexual harassment offenses in the area since 2023, prosecutors said.
Police received a report at 4:20pm yesterday of an incident in an alleyway off Minzu Road in New Taipei City’s Luzhou District (蘆洲).
You had followed a girl as she walked home from Sanmin Senior High School MRT station and tried to strike up a conversation, prosecutors said.
The girl, terrified, called her grandmother for help from outside her apartment building, they said.
You then attacked the grandmother, and the girl’s screams attracted the attention of Guo, they said.
When Guo came to assist, the two men became involved in a physical altercation, prosecutors said, adding that neighbors and passersby rushed to help, eventually subduing the suspect.
Once police arrived on the scene, You resisted arrest and was restrained and handcuffed before being taken in for questioning, they said.
Prosecutors last night requested that You be detained on suspicion of contravening the Stalking and Harassment Prevention Act (跟蹤騷擾防制法) and for causing serious injury and assault under the Criminal Code.
The crimes carry a minimum sentence of five years.
In Luzhou District, You has approached female students after school, touched a woman’s thigh in a library, groped women on the street and made sexually inappropriate comments in an elevator, prosecutors said.
In two cases, the victims did not press charges, while the other six cases were prosecuted under the Sexual Harassment Prevention Act (性騷擾防治法), they said.
You was sentenced to short-term detention for assault-related offenses, including detention for 120 days in March last year, they added.
Additional reporting by CNA
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