Last updated: August 2011
The Case of Chiou Ho-shun (邱和順)
Confession of an accused not extracted by violence, threat, inducement, fraud, exhausting interrogation, unlawful detention or other improper means … may be admitted as evidence.~Code of Criminal Procedure, Article 156
Significance: Taiwan’s longest-running criminal case: The defendant is faced with execution after 24 years in custody and 12 trials.
Summary: Chiou (along with 11 codefendants) was arrested in 1988 and held incommunicado for four months. During these months he was repeatedly interrogated and confessed, a confession he later retracted claiming that he was tortured. In 1993, a Control Yuan investigation unearthed tapes of interrogation sessions, and concluded that police had used torture. A number of police officers were impeached, and later convicted by criminal court. Despite this and lack of material evidence, the case dragged on for another 8 years until now.
