Sentenced to life in prison for impersonating a relative of Khanh Hoa Provincial Party Secretary to commit fraud

This is the land location that Khanh Hoa province assigned to another investor, but Nguyen Trong Thanh forged the land use right certificate, contributed capital to defraud and appropriate the assets of another investor.

The High People's Court in Da Nang has just heard the appeal and rejected the appeal of defendant Nguyen Trong Thanh (32 years old, living in Vinh Ngoc commune, Nha Trang city, Khanh Hoa province), who impersonated a relative of the Khanh Hoa Provincial Party Secretary to defraud and appropriate property.

Forging documents to defraud

The Court of Appeal upheld the first instance verdict with a combined sentence of life imprisonment for Thanh for the two crimes of "fraudulent appropriation of property" and "forgery of seals and documents of agencies and organizations; use of fake seals or documents of agencies and organizations".

According to the records, Nguyen Trong Thanh is the legal representative of Thanh An Real Estate Company Limited (headquartered at 12C Hoang Hoa Tham, Nha Trang City).

In July 2018, Thanh met and introduced to Mr. Pham Duc H. (director of an investment joint stock company in Hanoi) that Thanh was the director of Thanh An Real Estate LLC, pretending to be the nephew of the then Secretary of Khanh Hoa Provincial Party Committee and was collaborating with Khanh Vinh Company (investor of package 6 of the My Gia urban area project, Nha Trang City).

The amount of money Thanh appropriated (nearly 61.4 billion VND) was transferred many times by Mr. Pham Duc H., representing 4 shareholders of the company of which he is the director, and given in cash to Thanh to buy houses, land, and contribute capital for investment in Khanh Hoa.

In addition to impersonating the nephew of a leader of Khanh Hoa province, Thanh also hired 8 fake documents including 3 decisions of the Provincial People's Committee, 4 notices of 2 departments of Planning and Investment, Natural Resources and Environment, Khanh Hoa Provincial Tax Department and 1 land lease contract of the province.

Thanh also prepared a "record of confirmation" of receiving the capital contribution, providing documents with the signature of Mr. LTQ - Secretary of Khanh Hoa Provincial Party Committee at that time - and a picture of the Khanh Hoa Provincial Party Committee seal.

According to the appraisal conclusion, the seals and signatures in 10 cases requested for appraisal are fake documents, the signatures are directly signed by forgers and the seals are directly stamped.

Defendant Nguyen Trong Thanh

Pretending to be Provincial Party Secretary to commit fraud

In addition to the forged documents, Thanh also impersonated Mr. LTQ and exchanged emails to "strengthen trust and confirm the feasibility of the project at Bai Dai" for the investment partners he defrauded.

After appropriating nearly 61.4 billion VND transferred and delivered by Mr. Pham Duc H., Thanh transferred a total of more than 24.6 billion VND into the accounts of 34 other individuals to pay debts, interest, and deposits.

According to the court, that was the source of money that was fraudulently appropriated from the victim. Therefore, the court ordered the 33 individuals who had received the money to return it to the victim (except for one case that received 50 million VND but died, so the court ordered the defendant to return it to the victim).

The court also forced Thanh to pay the remaining amount to the victims.

According to Tuoi Tre