Who Shot the President? One year later, police finally have a suspect. Too bad he's dead.(assassination attempt on Chen Shui-bian solved)

Byline: Tim Culpan

It's a story worthy of a Hollywood thriller--preferably directed by Oliver Stone, with a dash of Monty Python. An incumbent president facing potential defeat in a bitterly fought campaign survives an assassination attempt less than a day before polls open. The election goes ahead, Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian wins by a mere 0.22 percent margin and the opposition cries foul. As the first anniversary of the shooting nears, investigators have yet to find a shooter, a motive or even a weapon. So desperate is prosecutor Wang Sen-rong to crack the case that he asks the gods for guidance at a local temple. Their response--in the form of divination cards--is that he'll "reap a crop soon."

And reap he did. Enter Chen Yi-hsiung in the cameo role of the disgruntled voter. Investigators said last week that the unemployed man pulled the trigger at a March 19 campaign rally last year. But they can't question him--because he's been dead for almost a year. Blaming the president for his financial difficulties, Chen (no relation to Chen Shui-bian) supposedly sought revenge, according to family statements. Then he killed himself by drowning the following week. Chen was on an initial list of suspects, but detectives finally fingered him by listening to phone-tapped conversations. In one such call earlier this month, family members reportedly spoke of destroying a confessional suicide note, although Criminal Investigation Bureau Commissioner Hou Yu-ih declined in an interview to identify the speaker, or even to verify that the tapes exist.

The evidence is scant. Chen, it turns out, is the man who was shown in security footage wearing a yellow jacket and running from the scene. Commissioner Hou told NEWSWEEK that Chen's family and friends identified him soon after the video aired, but he wasn't questioned before his death. According to a statement from his widow after the breakthrough phone intercept, Chen left three suicide notes saying he did it. All were destroyed by family members. The family says Chen himself reduced the famous yellow jacket to ashes in the household shrine.

The lack of credible evidence--no note, no jacket, no gun--has sent media and conspiracy theorists into a frenzy. The new police theory "seems like a trap for the Taiwan people because it didn't answer many questions," says Chu Hung-yuan, author of "Shooting the President?" His book, released last June, is part of a mountain of documentation offered by the opposition as evidence ...