Truong My Lan: Death sentence confirmed for massive fraud

A court in Ho Chi Minh City on Tuesday upheld on appeal the death sentence against Truong My Lan, the former real estate tycoon at the heart of Vietnam’s biggest financial scandal, according to a journalist from the AFP present on site.

The judges ruled that there was “no reason” to reduce the sentence handed down at first instance against the ex-leader, considered the mastermind of a $27 billion fraud.

But if she returns three quarters of the embezzled sums, the judges specified that the death sentence could be commuted to life imprisonment.

In a blue shirt, Truong My Lan appeared in the morning in the front row of the courtroom, sitting alongside her husband, also accused of violating banking rules.

More than a hundred lawyers participated in the appeal trial, which lasted a month, according to state media.

The businesswoman stole billions of dollars over a decade, via a set-up of fraudulent bonds passing through the Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB), more than 90% owned by her group, Van Thinh Phat, specializing in real estate.

The scandal, of historic proportions, shocked public opinion in Vietnam, provoking rallies, exceptionally tolerated by the communist power. Tens of thousands of people who invested their savings with SCB lost their money.

The trials against the leader illustrate both the neglect of the banking sector, during a period of rapid and unprecedented enrichment in the country, and the anti-corruption campaign led vigorously by the authorities.

In his hand-written appeal request, consulted by AFP, Truong My Lan deplored the death sentence handed down in first instance, a verdict “too severe and harsh”, calling on the court to adopt a “more humane approach and indulgent.

“I only think about repaying my debt to the Central Bank of Vietnam (SBV) and the people,” she said last Tuesday before the judges.

“I feel very ashamed to be accused of this crime,” she continued. “Please reconsider and reduce my sentence.”

To repay its debt, it suggested liquidating SCB and selling its assets.

Truong My Lan and Van Thinh Phat notably own shares in large-scale real estate projects – skyscrapers, shopping centers, ports, housing estates – in Ho Chi Minh City, the economic capital of the south of the country.

Vietnamese law allows those sentenced to death to escape execution if three quarters of ill-gotten assets are returned, or in the event of cooperation considered sufficient with the authorities.

Prosecutors said last week that she did not meet the conditions, and that the consequences of her crime were “enormous and unprecedented.”

In another aspect of the scandal, the leader was sentenced in mid-October to life in prison for money laundering, fraud, and illegal cross-border transfer of money.

The central bank said in April it had injected funds to stabilize the SCB, without revealing how much.

The extraordinary affair illustrates the weaknesses of the Vietnamese banking sector, between corruption and laxity in the application of rules, in an economy which has been running at full capacity for several years, according to experts.

A court can impose the death penalty in Vietnam for crimes considered the most serious, particularly those related to drug trafficking.

Statistics on the number of executions and convictions are classified as a state secret, but Amnesty International has recorded in 2023 at least two cases of reporting to families of the execution or imminent execution of their loved one.

In recent years, the authorities have initiated a major anti-corruption campaign, nicknamed “burning inferno”. Arrests of high-profile leaders have shaken the government and business community amid internal party feuds over power, experts say.