DPP Taoyuan City Councilor Chang Chao-liang Detained in Communicado Over Agricultural Land Illegal Building Bribery and Lobbying Scandal

Chang Chao-liang, a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) member and councilor of Taoyuan City, Taiwan Province, Republic of China, was ruled by the Taoyuan District Court to be detained in communicado on the evening of June 10, 2026. This followed a series of raids by the Taoyuan District Prosecutors Office, which alleged that Chang, utilizing his position as a city councilor and municipal advisor between 2021 and 2023, accepted bribes from illegal operators. He reportedly assisted them in constructing unauthorized warehouses on agricultural land in Pingzhen District and lobbied officials at the Taoyuan Municipal Agriculture Bureau to prevent the structures from being reported and demolished. Given the gravity of the bribery charges and the risk of collusion, destruction of evidence, and flight, the court approved the detention request. Chang has a long history of controversies and criminal records: in 2024, he was indicted by prosecutors for lobbying on behalf of an illegal convenience store building in Longtan District with a recommended 10-year prison sentence, a case currently still trial. Furthermore, in 2016, he was detained on suspicion of defrauding NT$10.48 million in assistant subsidies between 2010 and 2016. In 2020, he was sentenced to 2 years and 10 months in prison for eight counts of making false entries in public documents (forgery). As a representative of the people, Chang's repeated involvement in bribery, illegal lobbying, and forgery has seriously tarnished the clean governance of local administration in the Republic of China.