A top Vietnamese real estate tycoon now faces a death sentence as she and her co-defendants await the verdict in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with damages estimated at $27 billion .
Truong My Lan, chairman of major developer Van Thinh Phat, is accused of swindling money from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) for a decade.
More than a dozen cars and police vans carrying the defendants – a list that includes former central bankers, former government officials and former SCB leaders – arrived early in the morning at the courthouse in the colonial era.
After a five-week trial in Ho Chi Minh City, Lan and 85 others face verdicts and sentences on charges ranging from corruption and abuse of power to appropriation and violations of the banking law.
Lan allegedly embezzled $12.5 billion, but prosecutors said Thursday that the total damage from the scam now stands at $27 billion, a figure equivalent to 6% of the country’s GDP in 2023. The 67-year-old denied the accusations and blamed his subordinates.
Truong My Lan (center), chairwoman of Van Thinh Phat Holdings, sits during her trial at the People’s Court in Ho Chi Minh City
Lan allegedly embezzled $12.5 billion, but prosecutors said Thursday that total damages from the scam now stand at $27 billion.
After a five-week trial in the central business district of Ho Chi Minh City, Lan and 85 others face a verdict and sentencing.
Businesswoman accused of swindling money from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) for a decade
Prosecutors requested that Lan be sentenced to death, a particularly harsh sentence in such a case.
Most of the defendants sat in the courtroom with their heads bowed Thursday, although Lan could be seen fidgeting and looking up from the front row.
Prosecutors requested that Lan be sentenced to death, a particularly harsh sentence in such a case.
She and the others were arrested as part of a nationwide anti-corruption campaign that has swept aside many officials and members of Vietnam’s business elite in recent years.
Lan appeared to say in her closing remarks in court last week that she was having suicidal thoughts.
“In my despair, I thought about death,” she said, according to state media.
“I’m so angry that I was stupid enough to get involved in this very cutthroat business environment – the banking industry – that I know little about.”
Hundreds of people began protesting in the capital Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, a relatively rare phenomenon in the one-party communist state, after Lan’s arrest in October 2022.
Police have identified around 42,000 victims of the scandal which shocked the Southeast Asian country.
Do Thi Nhan, the former head of the inspection team at the State Bank of Vietnam, told the court she was offered a bribe.
Lan denied the accusations and blamed his subordinates. Pictured: Some of the defendants at the trial
The real estate mogul faces the death penalty if convicted over allegations she embezzled $12.5 billion.
Lan, who is married to a wealthy Hong Kong businessman also on trial, is accused of setting up false loan applications to withdraw money from SCB, in which she held a 90 percent stake.
Police say the victims of the scam are all SCB bondholders who cannot withdraw their money and have not received interest or principal repayments since Lan’s arrest.
Prosecutors said during the trial that they seized more than 1,000 properties owned by Lan.
Authorities also said the $5.2 million allegedly paid by Lan and some SCB bankers to state officials to cover up the bank’s violations and poor financial condition constituted the bribe. the most important wine ever recorded in Vietnam.
The woman to whom the bribe was offered – Do Thi Nhan, the former head of the inspection team of the State Bank of Vietnam – said that during the trial the money had given her was handed over in polystyrene boxes by former SCB CEO Vo Tan Van.
A major Vietnamese luxury real estate tycoon – Do Anh Dung, head of the Tan Hoang Minh Group – was sentenced to eight years in prison last month.
After realizing they contained money, Nhan refused the boxes but Van refused to take them back, state media reported.
More than 4,400 people have been charged during Vietnam’s corruption crackdown, in more than 1,700 corruption cases, since 2021.
A top Vietnamese luxury real estate tycoon – Do Anh Dung, head of the Tan Hoang Minh Group – was sentenced to eight years in prison last month after being found guilty of defrauding thousands of investors in of a $355 million bond scam.
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