Vietnamese billionaire sentenced to death for fraud

A court in Vietnam sentenced real estate magnate Truong My Lan to death on April 11 for her role in a 304 trillion dong ($12.46 billion) financial fraud case, the country's largest, state media reported.

Her trial, which began on March 5 and ended earlier than expected, is one of the dramatic results of a campaign against corruption that the leader of the ruling Communist Party, Nguyen Phu Chong, has promised for years to root out.
Lan, chairman of real estate group Van Thinh Phat Holdings Group, was found guilty of embezzlement, bribery and breach of banking regulations at the end of the trial in the business center of Ho Chi Minh City, state media said.

"We're going to keep fighting to see what we can do," a family member told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity. Before the sentencing, he had said that Lan would appeal the sentence.

Lan has pleaded "not guilty" to charges of embezzlement and bribery, said Nguyen Huy Thiep, one of Lan's lawyers.
"Of course she will appeal the sentence," he added, noting that she was sentenced to death on the embezzlement charge and 20 years on the other two counts of bribery and breach of banking regulations.

Vietnam imposes the death penalty mostly for violent crimes, but also for economic crimes. Human rights groups say hundreds of convicts have been executed in recent years, mostly by lethal injection.

Thanh Nien newspaper reported that the 84 defendants in the case received sentences ranging from probation for three years to life in prison. Among them are Lan's husband, Eric Chu, a Hong Kong businessman who was sentenced to nine years in prison, and her niece, who received 17 years./BGNES