Executive in expanding pepper scandal freed on bail
By Matthew Strong
Taiwan News, Staff Writer
2015-04-28 05:27 PM
TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The chairman of a company which had been found to add industrial-grade magnesium carbonate to its pepper products was freed on bail of NT$2 million (US$65,000) as the number of affected products ballooned to 16 Tuesday.
The practice was discovered by health inspectors at a New Taipei-based condiment maker known as Taiwan’s First Company.
The company’s chairman, Chen Ting-chih, reportedly told prosecutors during questioning Tuesday that he had been informed in 2007 that his son, Taiwan’s First CEO Chen Hsing-you, and his daughter, Deputy CEO Chen Ching-ju, were adding the industrial-grade substance to their pepper and salt powders.
A shareholder in a company which supplied Taiwan’s First with the magnesium carbonate was freed on bail of NT$50,000 (US$1,600), reports said.
Chen’s son and daughter reportedly also admitted for the first time that the industrial-grade substance was not only used in the original four products revealed in the investigation, but in a total of 12 other products as well. Health inspectors still had to perform tests on the additional substances, reports said.
When they were questioned last week and later released on bail, Chen Ting-chih was staying overseas. He was not questioned until Tuesday, but all three members of the family were now barred from moving home or leaving the country again, reports said.
Chen Ting-chih has been described by the media as a “father” of Taiwanese-style fried chicken.
