My friend has been summoned to appear before the prosecutor this month. He has spoken with the prosecutor in person once before, and someone at the prosecutor’s office says that they are in the investigation stage (not the trial).
It seems the landlord is claiming that he broke a lock of an empty apartment in the building and lived in it. The crime has been translated to him in many different ways including misdemeanor larceny, misdemeanor embezzlement, and criminal stealing.
One of the translations carried a sentence of up to 5 years in prison and a huge fine (he doesn’t remember the amount).
This might be relevant:
He didn’t update his address with immigration so the summons got sent to an old address. So, he was arrested at immigration to appear in front of the prosecutor.
When he goes to the prosecutor, is it possible that they will see the fact that he didn’t keep his address updated, and that he’s a foreigner, as a justification to detain him, because they think he’s more likely to not show up in the future?
Questions:
How likely is it that he will be detained when he goes in to talk with the prosecutor this time, or on future appearances? (Someone at the prosecutors office says this is a possibility.)
If he refuses to say anything, could they detain him for this? Or are they more likely to detain him for some other reason, when the real reason is because he kept silent?
What will they most likely do during this investigation?
What rights does he have and how does he enforce them?
What documents can he obtain related to the case, and how does he do this?
Thank you for reading. Any help would be very much appreciated.
If he’s innocent, why would your “friend” not give his account and perhaps try and provide an alibi? Refusing to talk will imply guilt. I agree with @rooftopclown
Also, doesn’t the building have any CCTV to look through? My building has CCTV on my floor, so it’s easy to tell who is coming and going. That could exonerate your friend if he is truly innocent.
Not once you said “your friend” is innocent, which leads me to believe “your friend” isn’t.
So, it seems you are looking for some way to avoid prosecution, or to reduce the sentence.
I’d suggest you to talk to a lawyer first. You could get a legal counseling for free at Legal Aid Foundation. https://www.laf.org.tw/en/
Be aware that there is no protection under the law for squatters in Taiwan. This obviously is a squatting situation since if it was a legal rental you’d have a record of rental payments. The friend obviously couldn’t update his address with immigration since he had no tenancy agreement. Most likely they will hold his passport but not detain him. As to sentence my guess would be no prison term and a smallish fine so long as no damage was done to the property.
Disclaimer: I have no idea what will actually happen since this is all third hand news.
It’s not entirely clear what this is about – is the guy accused of occupying two units simultaneously, or is he accused of coming back after the move-out date, or what? – but as a general statement, if the landlord asked for cash and gave no receipts, that would be a strong indication of tax evasion, but iirc it wouldn’t make the rental itself illegal.
