Prosecutors indict 13 suspects in Taipei Buddhist cult murder case

Taipei, March 6 (CNA) Taipei prosecutors on Thursday indicted 13 people in connection with the death of a woman whose body was found at the meeting place of a Buddhist group in the city's Da'an District last year.

Upon completing their investigation into the case, prosecutors indicted the 13 suspects for crimes including causing bodily injuries leading to death, complicity in causing bodily injuries leading to death, and coercion.

Those charged included the group's spiritual leader, the Buddhism writer Wang Yun (王薀), as well as Taiwanese actor Lee Wei (李威), whom prosecutors said had turned state's witness in return for a reduced sentence.

Police received a tip-off in late July 2024 about a woman found lying motionless in a first-floor property on a residential block on Siwei Road in downtown Taipei.

After arriving at the scene, police found the woman surnamed Tsai (蔡), a follower of the religious group that gathered at the meeting place, with no vital signs.

A subsequent autopsy determined that the woman died of rhabdomyolysis, a complex medical condition involving the rapid dissolution of damaged or injured skeletal muscle.

It is most often caused by direct traumatic injury, according to the National Library of Medicine, a United States National Institutes of Health website.

Surveillance video footage, meanwhile, showed Lee, the religious group's chief executive surnamed Wu (吳), a woman surnamed Chiang (姜), and Tsai, going to a study session at a restaurant on the evening of July 23, as Typhoon Gaemi dumped rain on Taipei.

After the meeting, Wu, Lee and Chiang were recorded pushing Tsai's body back from the restaurant to their usual meeting place in a trolley, dumping it there, and then leaving without calling emergency services, authorities said.

After a probe and two rounds of searches, prosecutors and police concluded that Wu, Wang Yun and several others were involved in Tsai's death, and named them as suspects.

Four of the original 11 suspects were detained in January, while Lee and his wife were named as suspects on Feb. 24 after previously being questioned in the case as witnesses.

New details from prosecutors

In the indictment Thursday, prosecutors said that Wang Yun had become angry with Tsai because of losses she incurred while managing the group's finances. Other members of the group had also come into conflict with Tsai because of her difficult personality, the indictment said.

Wang initially suggested that Tsai do penance by shaving her head and becoming a nun, which she refused.

In May, Wang gathered his followers to forcibly hold Tsai down while they shaved her head, and then ordered her to live in an apartment above the restaurant where they met, and keep a daily regimen that involved prostrating herself 400 to 500 times.

When Tsai threatened to kill herself, Wang ordered her to be moved into the group's meeting place down the street, the indictment said.

Beginning in July, the group started holding what amounted to struggle sessions at the restaurant, in which Tsai and another woman who had fallen out of favor with the group were denounced and forced to dance around and prostrate themselves.

On July 23, over 10 members of the group gathered at the restaurant and demanded that Tsai apologize for her alleged misdeeds.

When Tsai refused, other members of the group physically forced her to prostrate herself and then began hitting and kicking her when she told them she could not get up.

After bringing Tsai back to the meeting place that night, group members began discussing the situation in an internal chat group, and decided to call an ambulance for her at 10:15 a.m. the next day, by which time she was already dead, prosecutors said.

In order to conceal their involvement, members of the group disposed of the trolley and some of Tsai's personal belongings, and deleted their message histories or even changed phones, prosecutors said.

Acting on orders from Wang Yun, Lee also held online meetings with members of the group to coordinate what they would tell investigators.

In total, members of the group also placed 200-300 calls to area lawyers after Tsai's death seeking legal consultation, prosecutors said.

Lee, 44, rose to fame after starring in the popular drama "Toast Boy's Kiss" in the 2000s. He became a devout follower of Buddhism in recent years after leaving the entertainment business.