Taichung: Five people have been sentenced to jail terms ranging from 10 to 26 months for stealing state-owned diesel, according to a ruling released by the Taichung District Court on Tuesday. In its April ruling, the court identified the individuals as a man surnamed Chen, his sister, her boyfriend, and two others, Tu and another man also named Chen. They were found guilty of the aggravated theft of 2,000 liters of diesel from CPC Corp., Taiwan. According to Focus Taiwan, the theft was uncovered in September 2022 when CPC reported abnormal fluctuations in a damaged oil pipeline in the Qingshui District. Surveillance footage revealed that the group used a nearby metal structure with a corrugated steel roof to siphon oil from multiple pipelines. Their method was inspired by the South Korean movie "Pipeline." The boyfriend of Chen's sister initially purchased equipment costing NT$500,000 to access a Formosa Petrochemical Corp. pipeline in Changhua between January and February 2022. However, this attempt failed after they only managed to remove the reinforced concrete above the pipeline. By May and June, Chen's boyfriend had provided NT$390,000 to her brother to work on other CPC pipelines in Qingshui. The group then rented a corrugated steel structure to prepare and began digging four pipelines in August using pickaxes and electric hammers. They successfully siphoned 2,000 liters of diesel from one of the pipelines, valued at NT$60,000. The theft also resulted in severe damage to the CPC pipelines, rendering them unusable. In April, the court sentenced the group to jail terms of 10 to 26 months. Additionally, CPC filed a civil case demanding NT$1.26 million in compensation for the stolen diesel, pipeline damage, and repair costs. Apart from Tu, who settled with CPC by paying NT$250,000, the court ordered the remaining four to pay a combined total of NT$1.01 million in October.