A Vietnamese court has upheld the death sentence of real estate mogul Truong My Lan, chairwoman of Van Thinh Phat Holdings Group, after rejecting her appeal against a conviction for embezzlement and bribery.
Lan, 67, was sentenced in April for her involvement in a fraud scheme totaling over $12 billion.
She was found guilty of embezzling funds, bribing officials, and violating banking regulations during a month-long trial.
The prosecution emphasized the unprecedented scale of the crime, stating, “The consequences Lan caused are unprecedented in the history of litigation and the amount of money embezzled is unprecedentedly large and unrecoverable.” They added, “The defendant’s actions have affected many aspects of society, the financial market, the economy.”
Lan and her co-conspirators were accused of illegally taking control of the Saigon Joint Stock Commercial Bank between 2012 and 2022, using the bank to funnel funds to numerous shell companies and bribe government officials.
Between 2018 and 2022, when SCB faced a collapse and was bailed out by the state, investigators say Lan embezzled vast sums by facilitating illegal loans to these ghost companies.
As of April, Vietnam’s central bank had injected $24 billion into SCB in what was described as an “unprecedented rescue,” according to Reuters.
Lan’s legal team has argued in mitigation that she has confessed, expressed remorse, and repaid part of the stolen funds.
Vietnamese news outlet VnExpress reported that if Lan returns three-quarters of the embezzled money while serving her sentence, there may be a possibility of her sentence being reduced to life imprisonment.
Lan retains the right to request a review of the case.
