American Notes Crime

On a brisk October morning last year, Henry Liu, 52, a businessman and part-time journalist, was shot dead by Asian gunmen outside his home in Daly City, Calif. Liu's widow suspected that the murder was politically motivated. Under the pen name of Chiang Nam (River South), Liu had written books and articles that assailed Taiwan. "It was a terrorist killing," said Jerome Garchik, Mrs. Liu's lawyer. "Henry Liu was killed to silence his work and also to intimidate Chinese living in America." U.S. officials say that Liu had apparently acted at various times as an agent or informant for Peking, Taipei and U.S. authorities--and may have been caught in his triple dealing.

Last week, in a startling admission, the Taiwan government said that members of its military intelligence organization were involved in Liu's murder. Two Nationalist gangsters who had reportedly confessed that they helped carry out the crime said that Colonel Chen Hu-men, a deputy department director in the intelligence bureau of the Ministry of National Defense, was aware of the plot. The colonel was arrested last week, while other Nationalist officials under suspicion were being questioned.