Personal safety
In fact, interpreting is a job fraught with potential danger, so there must be proper management and procedures. Chen mentions an unsolved case from 2012 in which an interpreter was murdered, which should be a warning to the judicial community.
In early 2012, Peter Chen, the Judicial Reform Foundation and other non-governmental groups presented a petition at the Control Yuan to promote a formal management system for judicial interpreting. After investigation, the Control Yuan issued a corrective report, but left out one thing: measures to protect the personal safety of interpreters.
Two months later, an investigator from the Control Yuan contacted Chen to talk about a news story that a Filipina interpreter in Yilan had been murdered. Although from surveillance camera footage the police had identified a Filipino worker who appeared at the scene of the crime, he hurriedly left Taiwan the following day and has never been interviewed.
It was reported that the deceased had a shop, and had served as an interpreter for many years. Before she died, she had interpreted at the district prosecutors office for a Filipino migrant worker. But the worker felt that she had failed to speak up for him as her fellow countryman, and so he bore a grudge against her.
In view of the sensitive nature of the work, Peter Chen earnestly exhorts his students that to avoid conflicts of interest, “you shouldn’t push to get any specific judicial interpreting assignment, and if faced with an inappropriate counterpart, you should refuse the assignment.” There are even rules for where the interpreter should stand in court, to ensure their personal safety, he explains.
Peter Chen, who has lectured and taught across the country, is endeavoring to upgrade the quality of judicial interpreters.