Ko charged and out on bail

The prosecutors are looking to put the Taiwan People’s Party chairman away for 28 years. But for now, he’s out on an eye-watering bail.

TPP Chairman Ko Wen-je tearfully facing the media after being released on bail on the 27th

After four months of being held incommunicado, Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman Ko Wen-je has finally been charged with bribery and other forms of corruption. The Taipei District Prosecutors Office is seeking to put the former Taipei mayor away for 28.5 years. To me, this is an extraordinary sentence. Recall that the guy who went on a stabbing spree on the Taichung Metro only got 10 years. So what exactly is in the prosecutors’ case?

The sprawling 190-page PDF indictment document has been pour over, summarized, endlessly chewed over on those political streaming shows that I’m unfortunately addicted to. It contains juicy details such as how Ko likes to refer to himself as “his majesty” (朕) in front of his staff and lurid descriptions of interactions with the moneyed class that belies Ko’s image as a swamp-draining political outsider.

In one incident, Ko’s office solicited a NT$3 million (US$93,000) political donation from online gambling tycoon Chen Ying-chu. Chen’s assistant hand-delivered the sum — in cash, natch — to Ko’s office, where the Mayor was furiously riding his spinning bike. The assistant introduced himself but instead of getting off the bike Ko just nodded and said “uh-huh.” Eventually, realizing the mayor wasn’t going to get off the bike, the assistant awkwardly set the bag o’ money on the coffee table with his name card and excused himself. “Good, thank you” said the Mayor, still spinning.

The thing is, referring to oneself as royalty is not against the law. Neither is accepting political donations and being curt to assistants. What IS actually incriminating in the indictment document?

The $15 Million Excel Sheet and other evidence

Remember the Core Pacific City development case? The one where Ko is alleged to have accepted bribes in return for increasing the Floor-Area-Ratio of Core Pacific City Mall? This must be the most important case, so let’s see the prosecutors’ evidence for it.

Well, they found a spreadsheet in Ko Wen-je’s thumb drive with an entry in it that says “Sheen Ching-jing, 1500.” The prosecutors interpret that as Ko accepting an NT$15 million bribe from Core Pacific City developer Sheen. The bribe was delivered in cash, said the indictment document, “at some time at some place.” In short, the prosecutors are merely postulating that such an exchange must have happened between Sheen and Ko. They don’t have actual evidence that it did, beyond the Excel entry.

They have more evidence for the side case of “Muko” Inc. Muko was a company set up to sell Ko-related merchandise. Everything from T-shirts to hats to power banks and the like. Muko was set up like a regular company, but it paid Ko a licensing fee to use his image. The prosecutors disagree: in its mind there’s no reason anyone would pay for the overpriced tchotchkes sold by Muko unless they thought it was a political donation. But since the income was logged like a regular company, not a donation, Ko is in fact guilty of corruption.

In general, where you stand on this case depends on where you sit. Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) supporters tend to think the Taipei District Prosecutors Office is doing just right. TPP supporters are howling in outrage that their leader is getting railroaded. Kuomintang supporters are more divided…most think he’s being done dirty, but a few (perhaps still stinging from his attack on former Taipei Mayor Hau Long-bin in an electoral campaign) are zealously rooting for this downfall.

The Court of Public Opinion

To me, the most fair-minded summary of the indictment document comes from Frank Hsieh, a long-time DPP politician and former defense attorney who just recently ended his stint as the Ambassador to Japan from Taiwan.

“Anyone reading Ko Wen-je’s indictment document must feel deeply repulsed by the complicated entanglements between politics and business. But in terms of the legal definition of crime, the evidence for corruption is indeed rather weak. Especially after holding the suspect in detention incommunicado for four months, to hand out such an indictment document will predictably see the rise of controversy that might further trigger changes in the political world.”

Frank Hsieh’s Facebook Post on the Ko case

I found this following paragraph especially illuminating:

“In Taiwan, sometimes the individual is not guilty in actuality but charged because he is guilty in the court of public opinion. In turn, manufacturing a ‘verdict in the court of public opinion’ has become an important aspect of our court battles. Almost all who are charge cries innocent whether they are or not. What is society to believe? As a result, the trust in the rule of law plummets, contributing to chaos in our society.”

What Now for Ko?

Ko is out on bail, looking frail and lacking his previous edge and imperiousness. He has decided to give up his chairmanship to the TPP as soon as possible. The reason is unclear: it could be because he’s feeling guilty, it could be because he thinks he’s being railroaded for political reasons and becoming less politically salient would help him or it could be he simply doesn’t want his own drama to drag down the TPP.

The case could drag on for years and however it shakes out for Ko personally, the damage politically has been done. He can no longer claim to be the doctor in the white coat coming to heal Taiwan’s body politics. Even if the case for bribery failed in court because the prosecutors don’t have enough evidence, his

One interesting vignette: the initial bail was set high at NT$30 million (eventually it got even higher). Ko’s bank accounts were frozen and there was a scramble to raise the substantial sum. Ko’s younger sister wanted to take donations from Ko’s diehard supporters to make it — a highly dubious move from a legal perspective. They didn’t end up following through but the fact that it was even considered is astonishing considering all the other troubles Ko is already in.

This confirms something I’ve suspected for a long time. Ko’s camp is simply extraordinarily sloppy and naive when it comes to money and the law. As political newcomers, they don’t understand there are certain ways things are done and not done. This opens them up to legal jeopardy more seasoned political parties would simply sidestep and could easily put Ko in jail on the Muko stuff.

As for the more serious charge in my mind — the Core Pacific City development case — the prosecutors have made a very weak case. For one thing, the mayor is not directly responsible for approving the hike in the floor-area-ratio. That was a committee. Ko could not have done this without their collaboration. They have not been charged, indicating the prosecutors also don’t have evidence that he pressured or bribed them in turn.

So far, everybody looks bad. Ko for chumming around with moneyed tycoons and the prosecutors for building a case around anecdotes and not evidence. The TPP have also dropped in popularity, although hardcore supporters are more convinced than ever that Ko is in fact innocent.

For Ko, the future is not bright. He has a parade of cases in front of him and I suspect if the Taipei District Prosecutors Office don’t get him on Core Pacific City they’ll get him on something else.

For the prosecutors…it just doesn’t look good. I don’t want to jump to the conclusion that they are out to get Ko, but their case rests mostly on conjecture while seeking an extraordinarily high sentence. The fact that most of the contents of the indictment document was leaked to the press in advance also makes a mockery of the concept of non-disclosure of investigation. A lot of the details included in the indictment document also feels like gratuitous character assassination.

It could be that by working harder to build their case in the court of public opinion, they’ve further degraded the trust of the public in the legal process.

For the TPP, it’s time to think about their future beyond their founder and leader. Even if he is ultimately found innocent, his political persona has been dealt a heavy blow it would be hard to return from.