Vietnamese property tycoon Truong My Lan escapes death penalty
The Vietnamese government has scrapped capital punishment for eight crimes, including embezzlement, corruption and espionage
Vietnamese real estate tycoon Truong My Lan, who masterminded a US$12.5 billion banking fraud, has avoided the gallows after the government on Wednesday scrapped the death penalty for eight crimes, including embezzlement.
Lan, the chairwoman of property giant the Van Thinh Phat Group, was sentenced to death last year on embezzlement and bribery charges.
Her lawyer said the sentence “will be converted to life imprisonment” after the National Assembly abolished capital punishment for eight offences, which included espionage, corruption, and an attempt to overthrow the government.
Giang Hong Thanh added that Lan was “very happy”.
Lan was convicted last April of using multiple ghost companies to gain control of the Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB), plundering US$12.5 billion from the lender.
But total damages caused by the fraud may have hit US$27 billion, according to prosecutors.
In May, an appeal court ruled that Lan, 68, could escape the death penalty if she paid back three-quarters of the amount stolen.
“If Ms Lan compensates for three quarters of the losses along with some other conditions, she will continue to be considered for a further reduction of her sentence,” lawyer Thanh said.
Lan “is still actively cooperating with state agencies of Vietnam and her partners to find ways to deal with [her] assets and restructure SCB to come to a final solution to the case”.
Those who were sentenced to death for the eight crimes before July 1 but have not yet been executed will have their sentences commuted to life imprisonment, according to state media.
Lan’s case had sent shock waves in Vietnam, where the swindled money was worth the equivalent of nearly 3 per cent of the country’s 2023 US$426 billion gross domestic product.
Her property empire was among Vietnam’s richest real estate firms, and its projects include luxury residential buildings, hotels and shopping centres.
Lan, who sold cosmetics in her teens, also owns several properties in Ho Chi Minh City’s prime locations and has multiple assets abroad, according to investigators.
She is married to Hong Kong investor Eric Chu Nap-kee. He was last year sentenced to nine years’ imprisonment for violating banking regulations.
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
