High court judges reject Chen’s appeal

They rejected the appeal filed last Tuesday by Chen’s defense lawyer Cheng Wen-lung on grounds that it wasn’t signed by the ex-president.

Cheng said he knew the appeal he made on behalf of the former president would not be accepted. “I filed it only with his tacit consent,” he added. He refused to appeal.

Chen went back on hunger strike on Day 9 of his detention at Tucheng, some 20 miles south of Taipei. He was released on Wednesday from the Taipei county hospital, where he had been kept under observation due to the effects of his fasting, which began on the day of his arrest and detention Nov. 12.

He was found to have an irregular heartbeat on Monday while on the hunger strike at the detention house and sent to Far Eastern Memorial Hospital in Banqiao. Fairly recovered, he was transferred to the nearby county hospital, where the detention house reserves a special ward room for him.

“I found President Chen has a fever,” his attorney told reporters after a visit to him at the detention house.

That might be due to his spending much time writing a memoir, Cheng said. “He has already written 20,000 to 30,000 words,” he added.

President Chen hopes to publish his memoir under the title: “A Dialogue in Prison,” Cheng said. “I also told him,” he added, “the stock market has tumbled, with the weighted index plunging below 4,200 points.”

“Then,” Cheng went on, “the former president told me President Ma Ying-jeou said the index would shoot up to 10,000 points if [Chen] were put into prison. President Chen told me he would rather be kept in prison if the index would really go up to 10,000.”

Asked if Chen is being pampered at the detention house, Cheng said the former president is just like any ordinary detainee. “He doesn’t have the privilege of having a hot water shower,” he pointed out.

Earlier at a Legislative Yuan committee meeting, Kuomintang lawmaker Chiu Yi blasted Wu Chen-chen, vice minister of the interior, for providing that showering privilege for the ex-president.

The former president is the last of the trio of Democratic Progressive Party leaders on a hunger strike. Su Chih-fen, magistrate of Yunlin, ended hers last week when she was indicted for corruption in a sewage construction scandal.

Her Chiayi counterpart, Chen Ming-wen, resumed taking food on Wednesday after his wife visited him at the Chiayi detention house to persuade him to end the self-imposed fast.

The magistrate of Chiayi County is under detention on charges of taking bribes in awarding a contract for a garbage dump.

As the case now stands, Chen Shui-bian has to stay behind bars until Jan. 11 next year, unless he is indicted. Prosecutors of the Special Counsel can ask to extend his detention.

If the Taipei district court complies, the former president will have to stay on at Tucheng two more months until March 11.

Meanwhile, the Taipei detention house is asking for the ex-president to pay for the treatment he received at the two hospitals in Banqiao.

Should Chen’s treatment be covered by national health insurance, Chen Shui-bian would have to pay NT$2,000. If not, he must pay NT$25,000.

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