Newsletter
Overview of the March 2026 Amendment Concerning Remaining Prison Sentence and Revoked Parole
The Constitutional Court rendered Judgment 113-Hsien-Pan-2 (2024) in March 2024, ruling that the previous Paragraph 5, Article 79-1 of the Criminal Code (which provided that individuals whose parole from life imprisonment had been revoked must serve a fixed remaining sentence of 20 or 25 years without exception) violated the principle of proportionality and the constitutional intent to protect personal freedom. Consequently, it was declared unconstitutional and would become invalid two years from the date of the judgment's announcement.
In response to this Constitutional Court judgment, the Legislative Yuan amended and passed partial provisions of the Criminal Code on March 13, 2026. The amendments add regulations for individuals whose parole from life imprisonment or fixed-term imprisonment has been revoked. Among the issues addressed are the determination of the remaining sentence length, the calculation of the minimum period to be served, the method for consecutive execution of other sentences, and the combined calculation of the minimum period to be served (Articles 78-1, 78-2, and 79-1 of the Criminal Code). The following regulations address the remaining sentence to be served:
1. Where the original sentence to be executed was life imprisonment, the newly added Article 78-1 of the Criminal Code provides the following:
Except for those individuals who commit a subsequent offense during the parole period that results in a final judgment of life imprisonment, a prison may report to the Ministry of Justice that prisoners who show verifiable evidence of remorse be reparoled after serving a certain period of imprisonment, as follows:
(1) 10 years: If parole is revoked pursuant to other legal provisions, or if the offender has intentionally committed a subsequent offense during parole that results in a final sentence of fixed-term imprisonment of less than 1 year.
(2) 15 years: If the offender has intentionally committed a subsequent offense during parole that results in a final sentence of fixed-term imprisonment of 1 year or more but less than 5 years.
(3) 25 years: If the offender has intentionally committed a subsequent offense during parole that results in a final sentence of fixed-term imprisonment of 5 years or more.
2. Where the original sentence to be executed was fixed-term imprisonment, the newly added Article 78-2 of the Criminal Code provides the following:
(1) For individuals with a remaining sentence of 10 years or less, the remaining sentence must be fully served before other sentences can be consecutively executed; the provisions of Paragraph 1, Article 79-1 of the Criminal Code regarding the combined calculation of execution periods do not apply.
For individuals with a remaining sentence exceeding 10 years, the individual must serve 10 years before the provisions of Paragraph 1, Article 77 of the Criminal Code shall apply to the execution of the remaining sentence (i.e., if more than one-half of the fixed-term imprisonment, or more than two-thirds of the sentence for recidivists, has been served, the prison may report to the Ministry of Justice for potential parole).