Van Thinh Phat Group chairwoman Truong My Lan receives additional life sentence

Truong My Lan, chairwoman of Ho Chi Minh City-based Van Thinh Phat Group, received life imprisonment on Thursday for fraudulent appropriation of property, 12 years in prison for money laundering, and eight years for illegally transporting currency across the border.

In the first phase of the Van Thinh Phat case, in April, Lan was sentenced to death for three crimes: giving bribes, violating lending regulations in the operations of credit institutions, and asset embezzlement. This judgment is yet to come into force as Lan and other defendants have appealed.

In the second phase of the case, the court determined that Lan "played a mastermind role, committing crimes with sophisticated tricks many times, causing particularly great consequences".

According to the jury, Lan, as chairwoman of Van Thinh Phat, had the highest decision-making power and governed all activities of the group. She set the policy and assigned others to commit fraudulent acts in issuing bonds, appropriating VND30,081 billion ($1.19 billion) from 35,824 investors.

She also directed her subordinates to "cut off cash flows to hide the origin of more than VND415,000 billion ($16.47 billion) of criminal origin" and illegally transport $4.5 billion across the border.

Therefore, the jury concluded that Truong My Lan held the highest responsibility in the Van Thinh Phat case, and sentenced her to life in prison for the three crimes.

Specifically, to lure customers (mostly depositors of Saigon Commercial Bank or SCB) to buy bonds, Lan and her accomplices used fraudulent tricks in selecting issuing companies and primary purchasing firms and in handling false cash flows.

Regarding money laundering, from January 2018 to October 2022, she directed her subordinates to deploy many tricks to transfer money out of the SCB system, like transferring money via accounts of individuals and entities, in order to hide the origin of VND415,000 billion embezzled from the bank and legalize it. These acts aimed to avoid authorities detecting and tracing the money flow.

Within 10 years (October 2012-October 2022), 21 member companies of Van Thinh Phat conducted 78 transactions to transfer over $1.5 billion abroad illegally, and 21 companies of this group received $3 billion from abroad illegally via 152 transactions.

SCB was formed in 2011 with the merger of three commercial banks at the State Bank of Vietnam’s request. As of end-2020, SCB had total assets of VND633.79 trillion ($25 billion), becoming the largest private bank and among the five largest lenders in the country alongside four state-owned peers.

According to its mid-year consolidated financial statements, its total assets amounted to VND761 trillion ($30 billion) at end-June 2022, before the bank was placed under special control.

During 2012-2022, Lan did not hold a position at SCB but owned a controlling stake of 85 to 91.5%.