16 years in prison for 9X impersonating police officer, telecommunications employee to commit fraud

On May 20, at the People's Court of Nghe An province, the Hanoi High People's Court opened a criminal appeal trial of defendant Nguyen Van Phi (born 1990), residing in Bao Dai commune, Luc Nam district, Bac Giang province, for the crime of"Fraudulent appropriation of property"The trial was opened due to the defendant's appeal.

The case file shows that around the end of 2018, Nguyen Van Phi contacted Pham Dinh Luan (born in 1993, residing in Luong Tai district, Bac Ninh, his wife's cousin) to ask Luan to find someone to open bank accounts and pay 3 million VND per card.

Luan contacted and opened 15 ATM cards of banks with Nguyen Huu Thu (born in 1991), Pham Dinh Phi (born in 1999), and Pham Cong Phuong (born in 1999). After that, Luan sent the cards to Taiwan for Nguyen Van Phi and received 45 million VND.

From Taiwan, Nguyen Van Phi called Luan, Thu, and Dinh Phi to agree to withdraw the money when the victims' money was transferred into their accounts. Nguyen Van Phi took out 15% to 20% of the embezzled money to divide among Luan, Thu, and Dinh Phi.

Defendant Nguyen Van Phi appealed for his innocence but the court rejected his appeal. Photo: Tran Vu

Within 8 days from August 21, 2017 to August 29, 2017, using voice conversion protocol, impersonating telecommunications switchboard employees, informing that they owed money, the case would be transferred to the police for investigation. When the victims affirmed that they did not owe money, they received a call with the number ending in 113, the other end of the line claimed to be a police officer investigating cases of money laundering, drug trafficking, and child trafficking in which money in the victims' bank accounts was suspected to be related. The subjects threatened and asked the victims to transfer money to serve the investigation. Fearful, 4 people in Nghe An and 1 person in Nha Trang City (Khanh Hoa) transferred more than 3.3 billion VND to the subjects.

Afterwards, Pham Dinh Luan was sentenced to 13 years in prison, Nguyen Huu Thu to 12 years in prison, and Pham Dinh Phi to 8 years in prison for “Fraudulent appropriation of property”. While his accomplices were in prison, Nguyen Van Phi was still hiding abroad. In early March 2020, Nguyen Van Phi was arrested by the police.

At the first instance trial of Nguyen Van Phi for the crime of Fraudulent appropriation of property, the defendant did not admit to the crime as charged in the indictment. However, the panel of judges determined that based on Pham Dinh Luan's self-confessions as well as the minutes of testimony and confrontation with Luan, there was sufficient basis to confirm that Nguyen Van Phi was the person who hired Luan to open the ATM card. Luan was paid by Nguyen Van Phi when he withdrew the money that this subject appropriated from the victims from the ATM card. The statements of Luan, Thu, and Dinh Phi during the investigation were consistent with the content of the case. Therefore, there was sufficient basis to prove that Nguyen Van Phi was the mastermind in committing the acts of fraud and appropriating more than 3.3 billion VND from the victims. The first instance court sentenced Nguyen Van Phi to 16 years in prison.

Defendant Nguyen Van Phi then filed an appeal claiming his innocence. At today’s trial, he claimed he did not know Pham Dinh Luan’s purpose for making ATM cards. Defendant Phi did not admit to directing the other defendants, but only helped Luan translate a few times. He claimed that the other defendants in the case colluded to frame him.

The appellate court determined that although at this trial, defendant Nguyen Van Phi claimed innocence and did not admit to committing the crime. However, based on Pham Dinh Luan's self-confessions as well as the statements and transcripts of the testimony and the transcripts of the confrontation, Luan affirmed that Nguyen Van Phi hired him to open an ATM card and would pay him for the service. Luan then told Thu and Nguyen Dinh Phi to make the card, withdraw money, and transfer it to Nguyen Van Phi as directed. Therefore, there was sufficient basis to affirm that defendant Nguyen Van Phi committed the crime of fraud and appropriation of property. Therefore, the appellate court rejected the defendant's appeal and upheld Nguyen Van Phi's 16-year prison sentence.