A man with a knife and smoke grenades attacked crowds indiscriminately in Taiwan's capital on Friday evening, killing at least three people and injuring nine others, according to the national news agency and the city government. The suspect later fell to his death from a department store building. Police said that the suspect was declared dead at a hospital after jumping from the building's sixth floor, the Central News Agency reports. The suspect, identified as a 27-year-old man named Chang Wen, threw smoke grenades near an underground exit of the Taipei Main subway station, close to the city's main train station, sending pedestrians running, according to local media reports.
Chang stabbed bystanders at the subway station, killing a man in his 50s, CNA reports. He then headed north to a popular shopping district, where he stabbed multiple people on the first and fourth floors of the Eslite department store, primarily in the neck, before jumping from the sixth floor of the building as he was pursued by police, authorities said. The city government said nine people were hospitalized, including one with serious injuries, the AP reports. Chang failed to report for reserve military training in November 2024, and he was wanted for violating the law on mandatory military service, CNA reports.
Taiwanese Premier Cho Jung-tai said Chang was wearing a mask and what appeared to be body armor, the Taipei Times reports. The Guardian notes that violent crime is relatively rate in Taiwan, but after previous mass stabbing on subway systems, some trains have instructional videos on disarming attackers. In 2014, a 21-year-old man killed four people and injured 24 in a mass stabbing on a Taipei subway train. He was executed two years later. Last year, on the tenth anniversary of the 2014 attack, a man stabbed two people on a train in Taichung before he was subdued by passengers. He told authorities he had chosen the date to make a statement about his dissatisfaction with society, per the Taipei Times.
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