An anti-stalking bill under deliberation in the legislature is still too limited, women’s rights advocates said yesterday as they called for more changes to the latest version of the bill.
The bill approved by the Executive Yuan in April has been stuck in cross-party negotiations since passing its initial reading.
It is the latest attempt in a string of stalled bills to address the issue of stalking, which is not explicitly addressed under current law, despite successive high-profile cases regularly calling attention to the issue.
The last proposal submitted by the National Police Agency in October last year was scrapped after criticism that it treated stalking as equivalent to harassment, and provided no immediate recourse for victims.
The Executive Yuan’s version of the bill defines stalking as a range of unwanted behavior that has a sexual or sex-related motive, is persistent or repeated, and engenders fear in victims that could disrupt their normal lives.
However, Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation chief executive Tu Ying-chiu (杜瑛秋) criticized the definition as too narrow.
Defining stalking as having a “sexual or sex-related motive” is limiting, while other actions aside from the eight specified, such as seeking debt repayment, could also be regarded as stalking, she said.
Police treatment of the issue is also limiting, Modern Women’s Foundation researcher Wang Chiu-lan (王秋嵐) said.
Women’s organizations have long called for criminal investigations into stalking cases, but the National Police Agency insists on treating them as lovers’ disputes, “using old-fashioned methods to resolve modern crimes,” she added.
A Ministry of the Interior official defended the draft, saying that if “stalking” is the only reporting requirement, it might become too much for police to handle.
As for the scope of the bill, they said that other laws are already in place to handle stalking cases unrelated to sex or gender.
Advocates also focused on the bill’s solution for immediate victim protections, which stipulates two rounds of warnings before punishments can be issued.
Under the draft, police would be required to issue a cease-and-desist warning after establishing the credibility of a stalking complaint, which would be valid for two years.
If the perpetrator does not comply, the victim, police or prosecutor could file for a protective court order, which if contravened would subject the perpetrator to three years in prison commutable to a fine of NT$300,000.
Taiwan Coalition Against Violence director-general Wang Pei-ling (王佩玲) criticized the regulations as insufficient, as victims could be in immediate danger, or terrified of when and how their stalker would strike next.
She therefore called for the court order to be issued along with a written warning, without waiting for another offense to happen in the interim.
In original drafts of the bill, the Judicial Yuan wanted a written warning to be issued before a court order, the ministry official said.
This way, the perpetrator could be handed a warning immediately, which comes with a slate of protections for the victim, they added.
Police could issue a warning at the first sign of danger and would not have to wait until the investigation concludes, as some critics of the bill fear, the official said.
The latest version of the bill might not meet all expectations, but it does “make the grade,” Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Fan Yun (范雲) said.
To address these concerns, the DPP caucus added an appeals process if a request for a warning is turned down, Fan said.
Meanwhile, the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) version of the bill would put the court order in motion as soon as a warning is issued, while requiring police to issue a warning within 72 hours of a report being filed, KMT Legislator Lin Wei-chou (林為洲) said.
