The Act Governing the Punishment of Violation of Road Traffic Regulations was enacted for purposes of strengthening road traffic regulations, maintaining traffic flow, and ensuring traffic safety (See Article 1 of the said Act). According to Article 85-1 of the said Act as amended and promulgated on January 22, 1997, any motorist who has been charged with violation of Article 56 thereof but has failed to observe the corrective order issued by an on-duty traffic police officer or any other personnel performing traffic inspection duties by law may be charged consecutively; the foregoing will apply mutatis mutandis to the circumstances where a corrective order cannot be issued on the spot. The said provision has made it clear that a motorist who engages in illegal parking under any of the various provisions of Article 56-I thereof may be consecutively charged and notified of his or her violations. In addition, Article 9-I of the said Act as amended and promulgated on January 17, 2001, provides, ‘In respect of the fines prescribed in this Act as a punishment, an actor may, upon receipt of a notice of violation regarding road traffic regulations, directly follow the regulatory punishment standard without administrative ruling and pay the amount of fine in full to the designated place within fifteen days for the purpose of closing the case; if the actor disagrees with the facts regarding the charge, he or she shall express his or her opinion or file a statement to the punitive agency; and if the actor neither appears at the designated place to listen to the ruling within the prescribed period, nor expresses his or her opinion nor files a statement within the prescribed period, the punitive agency may directly give a ruling in respect thereof.’ Therefore, if the facts show that an actor has received multiple notices of violations regarding road traffic regulations, he or she will have to make multiple payments of fines or may receive multiple rulings regarding the fines. In respect of illegal parking, as soon as a motor vehicle is parked in a no-parking zone, the requisite elements of illegal parking are satisfied. The fact of the violation will exist until the motor vehicle is removed from the no-parking zone. In respect of an constantly existing violation, the legislators, having considered that the existence of the said act will indeed affect public interest or public order, may enable the competent authority to eliminate not only the above violation in a timely manner by means of compulsory enforcement, but also to calculate the number of violations by counting the number of charges against the violations. In other words, every single charge is capable of leading to the finding of a single breach of duties under the administrative law and thus one violation is committed. As a result, where there are consecutive charges against an existing violation, there are multiple findings of breach of duties under the administrative law and thus multiple violations. Hence, multiple punishments may be imposed for multiple violations and this does not give rise to any issue of double jeopardy. Therefore, there is no violation of the principle of double jeopardy embraced by a rule-of-law nation.
Even though the legislators may enact legislation to enable the law enforcement personnel to achieve the purpose of administrative control through the preventive effects resulting from consecutive charges and the accompanying multiple punishments, the relevant provisions of law shall still be consistent with the principles of proportionality and clarity of authorization of law under Article 23 of the Constitution. More specifically, in respect of the prevention of the continuing occurrence of any violations through the preventive effect resulting from multiple punishments, the means of consecutive charges is employed against every violation with regard to continuing violations. And, based on the number of charges for such violations, the number of violations under the law will be evaluated and counted and thus multiple punishments will be imposed. The said means are beneficial to the achievement of the ends. As far as the purposes of maintaining traffic flow and ensuring traffic safety are concerned, the said means are even more necessary and effective given the limitations of objective circumstances. However, since every charge establishes a single violation, one should still examine the principle of proportionality under the Constitution to answer the question as to whether the interval between a previous charge and a subsequent one is too short to render multiple punishments adequate. Furthermore, in view of the developments and characteristics of traffic violations, a charge can be made even if the violating actor is not present. The legislators, in proposing to warn and prevent the violator from capriciously violating the law and thereby incurring consecutive charges, may authorize the competent authority to issue administrative orders in which the conditions of consecutive charges and the intervals and durations between a previous charge and a subsequent one are clearly prescribed after taking into consideration road traffic safety and other related factors.
Article 85-1 of the Act Governing the Punishment of Violation of Road Traffic Regulations as amended and promulgated on January 22, 1997, states, ‘Any motorist, dealership, or car repair business that has been charged with violation of Article 33, 40, 56 or 57 thereof but failed to observe the corrective order issued by an on-duty traffic police officer or any other personnel performing traffic inspection duties by law may be charged consecutively; the foregoing will apply mutatis mutandis to the circumstances where a corrective order cannot be issued on the spot; provided, however, that the violation point can only be counted once.’ The said provision merely states that consecutive charges may be made if a corrective order is not observed or cannot be issued on the spot. However, it has not provided anything in principle as to the kind of standards that shall be followed in making consecutive charges, especially the regulatory purposes and traffic factors to be considered in determining the intervals between a previous charge and a subsequent one. Although Article 12-IV of the Uniform Punishment Standard Forms and Rules for Handling the Matters regarding Violation of Road Traffic Regulations as amended and issued by the competent authority on May 30, 2001, under the authorization of Article 92 of the Act Governing the Punishment of Violation of Road Traffic Regulations states that ‘Consecutive charges may be made every two hours,’ which serves as a supplemental regulation and sets’ every two hours’ as the standard for making consecutive charges, it does not go beyond the extent of necessity after weighing the possible number of punishments incurred and the amount of fines accumulated by motorists, which are not substantial, against the legislative purposes of maintaining traffic flow and ensuring traffic safety. Nevertheless, it is proper that the purpose and scope of the authorization of consecutive charges be clearly established by law.
Article 56-II of the Act Governing the Punishment of Violation of Road Traffic Regulations provides, ‘An on-duty traffic police officer or any other personnel performing traffic inspection duties by law shall order a motorist to move his or her vehicle to a proper place; if the motorist refuses to move the vehicle or is not seated in the vehicle, the on-duty traffic police officer or such other personnel performing traffic inspection duties by law may do it by themselves, or employ a private tow truck to tow away the vehicle and collect the resulting relocation expenses from said motorist after charging him or her with the violation.’ Pursuant to the said provision, the law enforcement agency may certainly relocate the illegally parked vehicle after charging the motorist with the violation. However, in light of the limitations of objective circumstances, the latter part of the said provision also provides that the police agency may engage a private tow truck to tow it away. Nevertheless, as the foregoing provision provides ‘ may employ a private tow truck to tow it away,’ it may be concluded that the said provision does not require that an on-duty police officer shall employ a private tow truck to tow away an illegally parked vehicle, and that, even if a towaway is to be enforced, the said provision does not prescribe that the towing shall be done only after an initial charge has been made. The on-duty police officer has been authorized to decide upon the foregoing matters at his or her own discretion on a case-by-case basis. In addition, as it is proper that the traffic obstacle be removed by the violating actor him- or herself before enforcing a towaway, the on-duty police officer should be permitted to choose the means of law enforcement after investigating the circumstances and based on his or her discretion corresponding to his/her duties. Hence, in respect of the fact that the law enforcement personnel may decide upon the priority between enforcing relocation and custody and consecutive charges based on the circumstances regarding an illegally parked vehicle, it falls within the administrative discretion reasonably entrusted by the legislators to the administrative agencies by the legislators after considering various factors. Therefore, it cannot be concluded from the said provision per se that the provisions regarding consecutive charges and the resulting punishments violate the principle of proportionality under the Constitution.
In addition, it should be noted that Article 85-1-II (ii) of the Act Governing the Punishment of Violation of Road Traffic Regulations as amended and promulgated on July 3, 2002, provides,’ By directly charging a motorist with any violation by involving a motor vehicle of any of the various situations as prescribed under Article 56-I of the said Act, if the motorist is not present or cannot move the vehicle, consecutive charges may be made every two hours.’ In view of the fact that traffic flow may still be substantially affected in road sections with serious traffic congestion or during rush hours even if the vehicle remains the situation of illegally parking for less than two hours despite the unambiguousness of the aforesaid provision, it is proper that the legislators, while clearly prescribing by law the intervals for making consecutive charges, permit the competent authority, having considered the differences in traffic volume among various areas, to shorten the statutory intervals for making consecutive charges as far as it is consistent with the principle of clarity of authorization so that the maintenance of traffic order will not be affected by the rigidity of the said statutory intervals.
*Translated by Ching P. Shih.