TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Evidence in the unsolved 1980 murder of three family members of human rights activist Lin Yi-hsiung (林義雄) was systematically destroyed, President Lai Ching-te (賴清德) said Saturday.
He was speaking at a ceremony in Kaohsiung marking the 79th anniversary of the 228 Massacre, an uprising against the regime of former leader Chiang Kai-shek, followed by the deaths of tens of thousands of people and years of repression under martial law.
When Lin went on trial for his human rights activities on Feb. 28, 1980, unknown persons entered his home and killed his mother and his 7-year-old twin daughters. The case was never solved, but widespread suspicion focused on elements within the KMT’s martial law administration.
Lai said Saturday that even though all documents related to the Lin family murders had been released, much evidence had been systematically destroyed, the Liberty Times reported.
After he took office in 2024, he had instructed the National Security Bureau to go through its 1 million political files from the martial law era. Following 16 months of work, the intelligence agency this month released an additional 50,000 political files from the period before 1992, Lai said. The latest addition makes for a total of 140,000 political documents to have been made public.
However, research has shown that the files about the Lin family murders are incomplete. Notably, oral testimony was not precise or correct, Lai said.
At the time, the intelligence services actively interfered with the judicial investigation. Only the government at the time had the power to interfere with an investigation into murders of this nature, Lai said.
He also posed the question of how anyone had been able to enter the Lin home and commit the murders when the family had been under close observation by the authorities due to Lin’s human rights activities.
The case recently caught public attention again as a movie was made based on the murders — without asking for Lin’s permission and advice. The producers and actors apologized, but on Saturday, the Chilin Education Foundation launched by Lin turned down an offer from actress Nana Lee (李千娜) to donate her income from the movie, the Liberty Times reported.
