Prosecutors to Appeal Lenient Ruling in Chen Che-nan’s Case

Prosecutors to Appeal Lenient Ruling in Chen Che-nan’s Case

Sources: All Taipei Newspapers

July 29, 2010

The Taiwan High Court on July 24 handed down its ruling in the re-trial of a case involving Chen Che-nan, former deputy secretary-general to then President Chen Shui-bian, who had been sentenced to nine years in prison for receiving bribes through abuse of authority at his previous trial.  The High Court concluded that Chen was a common judicial broker and reduced his sentence from nine years to seven months for the lesser crime of fraud, sparking a public controversy.

The Taiwan Provincial Prosecutors Office stated that it regretted the High Court’s ruling and stressed that Chen Che-nan’s sentencing was too lenient compared to other judicial brokerage cases, and that the High Court contravened precedences in determining facts and in applying the law.  Therefore, the Taiwan Provincial Prosecutors Office decided yesterday to appeal the High Court’s ruling to the Supreme Court.

The Taiwan Provincial Prosecutors Office stated that judges of the courts of the first and second instance i.e., Taipei District Court and Taiwan High Court, all concluded that Chen Che-nan had committed fraud to obtain wealth through abuse of authority, and therefore, convicted him of criminal corruption, adding that this was still the majority opinion among the case judges.

In addition, in the re-trial, a different panel of judges of the Taiwan High Court concluded that although Chen’s behavior had seriously damaged the image of the justice system, the High Court took into consideration Chen’s old age, poor health, and the fact that Chen had returned the bribe money to businessman Liang Po-hsun in full, and sentenced Chen to a prison term of one year and two months, or 14 months, reducing it to 7 months.

The Taiwan Provincial Prosecutors Office concluded that since Chen’s behavior seriously damaged the reputation of the justice system, it was inappropriate to reduce his prison term.  In addition, the prosecutors questioned why the Taiwan High Court gave Chen credit for returning the bribe money Liang had given him to “settle” his case as Liang had demanded its return after Chen failed to live up to his word.  It was not that Chen had voluntarily returned it.  That being the case, the prosecutors expressed dismay that Chen’s age and poor health were given consideration.

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