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NTU professor is aquitted over anti-ARATS protest case
By Chang Wen-chuan / Staff reporter
The Taipei District Court yesterday acquitted National Taiwan University (NTU) sociology professor Lee Ming-tsung (李明璁) on a charge of violating the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) during a demonstrations against the visit of a Chinese official in November 2008.
Lee was indicted in May 2009 for being one of the initiators of a sit-in in front of the Executive Yuan on Nov. 6, 2008, along with a group of students, against what they said was the excessive force used by police to disperse participants during a visit by Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), then chairman of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits.
Lee was arrested for holding the sit-in without a permit.
The sit-in was the beginning of what was called the Wild Strawberries movement.
In 2010, Taipei District Court Judge Chen Su-fan (陳思帆), who was presiding over the court case against Lee and another professor, suspended the hearing and asked the Council of Grand Justices for a constitutional interpretation of the Assembly and Parade Act.
On March 21 this year, the grand justices struck down the requirement that permission should be obtained before outdoor rallies of an urgent or incidental nature can be held, ruling that the relevant clause in the Act violated the Constitution and was against the principle of proportionality.
Citing the grand justices’ Constitutional Interpretation No. 718, the Taipei District Court found Lee not guilty of violating the Act on grounds that the demonstration he took part in was a spur-of-the-moment event, and that he had not been the organizer of the event.
The ruling can be appealed.
source: Taipei Times
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