UNDER THE SAME BOAT

Kindness is a universal value, but if the price of kindness is 18 years in prison, would you still choose it?

20 years ago, CHEN Huo-sheng was a captain and also the central figure in a drug trafficking case. He believed the justice system would eventually clear his name, not knowing that the clouds of injustice are harder to escape than pirates at sea. The formation of a wrongful conviction seems complex, but upon closer examination, it’s not difficult to understand. But the question is, does injustice only have one face? CHEN may have been wronged, but the drugs were indeed brought back through him, and a seemingly unintentional mistake resulted in an 18-year sentence. So, let us use this case to explore Taiwan’s judicial structure in depth.