Real estate tycoon Truong My Lan gets life sentence

The Ho Chi Minh City People’s Court on October 17 handed over a life sentence to Truong My Lan, former chairwoman of property developer Van Thinh Phat Group for "fraudulent appropriation of property," "money laundering," and "illegal cross-border currency transportation", in the second phase of a case involving the group and the Saigon Joint Stock Commercial Bank (SCB), the Vietnam News Agency has reported.

Specifically, she received a life sentence for "fraudulent appropriation of property," a 12-year jail sentence for "money laundering," and an eight-year jail sentence for "illegal cross-border currency transportation". The combined sentence amounts to life imprisonment.

Earlier, in the first phase of the case, Lan was sentenced on April 11 this year to 20 years behind bars for "giving bribery", 20 years for "violating lending regulations in credit institutions," and the death penalty for "embezzlement." The total sentence she must serve is the death penalty.

The remaining 33 defendants received jail sentences ranging from two to 23 years.

Among them, Truong Hue Van, former General Director of Van Thinh Phat Group and former General Director of Windsor Property Management Group, who is also Lan’s niece, was sentenced to five years in prison for "fraudulent appropriation of property".

Chu Nap Kee Eric, former Chairman of the Board of Directors of Times Square Investment Corporation and Lan’s husband, received a two-year prison sentence for "money laundering".

Truong Khanh Hoang, former General Director of SCB, was sentenced to 23 years in prison for his involvement in all the three charges of "fraudulent appropriation of property”, "money laundering," and "illegal cross-border currency transportation”.

According to the indictment by the Supreme People's Procuracy, Lan built a vast network of about 1,000 subsidiaries and affiliated companies under the Van Thinh Phat umbrella, entrusting their management to relatives. Despite not holding any official position at SCB, Lan was its major shareholder, controlling between 85% and 91.5% of the shares.

Lan and her accomplices selected and appointed their relatives to key positions at the bank, formed a number of SCB units specializing in lending and disbursement at Lan’s request, established and used thousands of "ghost" companies. The group colluded with leaders of many related businesses to commit crimes, and created bogus loan profiles to withdraw money from the bank, among other acts.

From October 9, 2018 to October 7, 2022, Lan directed the creation of 2,527 fake loan records, with a total value of VND1,066 trillion ($44.4 million). As of October 17, 2022, Lan and her accomplices still owed VND677.28 trillion ($26.8 billion) in loans, which were all bad debts. After deducting the value of collaterals, the bad loans valued at around VND498 trillion ($19.7 billion).

As of October 7, 2022, Lan and her accomplices embezzled over VND30.081 trillion ($1.19 billion) from 35,824 victims, and laundered VND445.747 trillion ($17.68 billion).

From 2012-2022, they illegally transported $4.5 billion across the border.

At the trial, the defendants were also demanded to pay over VND30.081 trillion (nearly $1.2 billion) in compensation to 35,824 victims.