A high-ranking Taiwanese tax officer has been detained on suspicion of taking payoffs to help selected taxpayers cut their tax bills — bad news for public trust in the tax agency, and a sign that big money was changing hands behind the scenes.

• A senior auditor at the Finance Ministry's Central Region tax office is accused of working with accountants to help certain people avoid taxes in exchange for kickbacks.
• Investigators ran six rounds of searches and seized over ten million Taiwan dollars in cash and gift vouchers from his home.
• He and two accountants have been held in custody without visitors; a third accountant was released on bail.
• His job put him just below the office's top leadership, with wide discretion over income, inheritance, and gift tax cases — the exact power prosecutors say he sold.
• He drove an ordinary car to work but turned out to own a luxury home and expensive cars, far beyond what a civil servant's salary would explain.

Outlook: The tax office has suspended him and cancelled his retirement, and prosecutors are expected to keep tracing the money and the taxpayers who benefited.