Ex-Cabinet officer was not guilty in the case of sex scandal

• From Wang Chun-Chung and Shih Hsiao-Kuang / Staffreporters with CNA

The district court in Tainan did not guilty the former cabinet spokesman Chen Tsung-Yen (陳宗彥) on Thursday that he had accepted sexual favors and bribes, and quoted inadequate evidence.

The case began in 2013 when Chen worked as head of the Tainan Department of Information and the Civil Affair Bureau. During his tenure, he was asked to help with a transfer request from a police chief and to help the local government's approval process for the conversion of a night club.

Chen was accused of having accepted favors of the nightclub owner who was identified as someone.

Chen went to the nightclub, where Lien and Wang supposedly prompted to receive sexual services from a host.

In April 2014, the case was recorded for a lack of evidence of separate treatment. The follow -up examination also ended without indictment, since no bribery could be justified.

At the beginning of 2023, a new complaint revived the case, which withdrew from his cabinet post after only 18 days in office.

The public prosecutor accused Chen on August 15 last year and was looking for a serious sentence because he showed little remorse.

Chen supposedly had sex with three women who used pseudonyms, 16 times in which 10 payments of $ 12,000 and two cases, in which gifts were given instead, included.

Due to the decades of time gap, however, the prosecutors could not locate or conjure up the three women to testify.

Chen kept his innocence and denied the accusations.

In an explanation, the court said that people in a listening recording mentioned a “chairman Chen (陳董), but the investigators were not sure whether it was related to Chen Tsung-Yen, and that there was a lack of evidence that related him directly.

“Lien and Wang during the examinations and cross tests contested the order of sexual favors for chen, and the listening recording did not refer directly to Chen, so that Chen has been acquitted,” says the court report.

The recording also only learned conversations between Wang and other employees during the alleged period of the incident, according to the submission and added that there were no conversations between Wang and Chen.

“Now that I am acquitted, I feel grateful and relieved. I hope this dark shadow about me can now be lifted,” Chen said on Friday in an explanation.

Lien and Wang were acquitted to “achieve an illegal financial gain from sexual favors”, but were found in 10 cases for guilty in which “the order of sexual service transactions for unknown male customers” was benefited.

They received suspended punishments for which they could pay fines instead of the prison sentences – one year for lien and six months for Wang, the court report said.

The judgment can still be appealed.

Additional reporting from Jason Pan