Female director who swindled project sales sentenced to 19 years in prison

On September 15, the Hanoi People's Court opened a first-instance trial and sentenced defendant Nguyen Thi Phuong Lan (born in 1978, residing in Thinh Liet ward, Hoang Mai district, Hanoi) to 15 years in prison for "Fraudulent appropriation of property", 4 years in prison for "Forgery of seals and documents of agencies and organizations", the total sentence for defendant Lan is 19 years in prison.

According to the indictment, in 2018, Nguyen Thi Phuong Lan was the Director of An Van Loc One Member Limited Liability Company (An Van Loc Company) headquartered in Mo Lao Ward, Ha Dong District, Hanoi; specializing in business activities in the fields of construction, transportation and tourism. During this time, due to difficult economic conditions, Lan's company had no business activities.

Taking advantage of the real estate activities of a large corporation, Lan provided inaccurate information, introducing herself to many people as Lan's An Van Loc Company, which had many real estate investment projects with fast investment and high profits... with the purpose of mobilizing capital from many investors to appropriate assets.

Lan received money from many people and then used it to pay part of the principal and interest to the capital contributors. At the same time, she also forged a Certificate of land use rights, house ownership rights and other assets attached to land No. CM478406 under the name of Nguyen Thi Phuong Lan to use as collateral for investment. Therefore, many people trusted Lan to invest with her.

Using the above methods and tricks, from January 3, 2019 to July 2019, Lan mobilized capital from 3 victims and then appropriated a total of more than 10 billion VND.

Among Lan's victims, Ms. Nguyen Ngoc M was the one who lost the most, more than 7 billion VND. Ms. M and Lan were neighbors, living in the same apartment building, so they knew each other.

Lan introduced to Ms. M that Lan has many real estate investment projects related to large real estate corporations and profitable business investments, so she invited Ms. M to invest. Lan offered a very high profit margin, with an investment that could double in a very short period of time, from about 3-15 days.

To create trust, for all investments, Lan always presents specific projects, capital contributions and profit levels, and signs profit commitments in the Capital Contribution Agreement and specific capital contribution appendices.

Ms. M trusted her and agreed to contribute capital. On January 2, 2019, Lan and Ms. M signed a Capital Contribution Agreement with the following content: Investing in business in the form of quick investment. The amount of capital contributed and the time limit for capital contribution are flexible according to each time of calling for capital contribution.

From January 3, 2019 to July 2019, Ms. M transferred more than 27 billion VND to Lan many times to contribute capital to invest in projects. After receiving Ms. M's money, Lan did not invest as promised but used this cash flow to gradually pay Ms. M.

From January 4, 2019 to September 27, 2019, Lan transferred to Ms. M a total amount of more than 20 billion VND out of a total of more than 27 billion VND in contributed capital.

After that, Lan had no more money to continue paying and fulfilling other commitments with Ms. M, so she signed a debt confirmation document.

After many unsuccessful attempts to collect debt, on November 11, 2019, Ms. M filed a complaint against Lan for fraud and property appropriation to the Investigation Agency, Hanoi City Police.