Three days of escape from Chi Hoa of death row prisoner infected with Covid-19
Nguyen Kim An, 27 years old, infected with Covid-19, escaped from Chi Hoa prison, wandered around many places begging for money, was taken in by a technology driver, and let to sleep over before being arrested.
On July 16, death row inmate Nguyen Kim An, from Ninh Thuan, was dressed in protective gear by detectives from the Criminal Police Department (PC02) of Ho Chi Minh City Police and taken to Chi Hoa detention camp - where he had escaped 3 days before.
"During his escape, An had no accomplices. These days, the city is isolated and deserted, so he wandered around many streets begging for money and food. When he was arrested, the police confiscated an old phone and several hundred thousand dong. An said that people sympathized with him and gave him some money," said Lieutenant Colonel Tran Van Hieu (Head of PC02).
An was sentenced to death by the High People's Court in Ho Chi Minh City for the crime.KillingandRobberySeptember 2015.After nearly 6 years of waiting for the death penalty, on July 13, he escaped from Chi Hoa prison after testing positive for nCoV.
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| Nguyen Kim An after being sentenced to death, June 2015. Photo: Binh Nguyen. |
Assessing the incident as particularly serious and dangerous to the people, the Ho Chi Minh City Police Department requested the leaders of PC02 and the entire criminal police force to track down the prisoner, searching every alley, neighborhood... They also received support from the Criminal Police Department (C02, Ministry of Public Security), Thu Duc City Police and districts, as well as colleagues from neighboring provinces.
The scouts split up to check Covid-19 field hospitals, quarantine areas... because they could not rule out the death row inmate taking advantage of these places to hide. The authorities at checkpoints in Ho Chi Minh City also carefully checked passersby.
Security cameras recorded An wearing a black T-shirt, jeans, mask, carrying a nylon bag, limping (due to injuries while escaping) through the streets of District 10, Tan Phu...
Last night, he went to Vo Van Ngan Street, near the Thu Duc Children's Cultural House (Thu Duc City). Seeing Mr. Tuyen (56 years old, a motorbike taxi driver) stop to give money to a beggar on the side of the road, An gave him 200,000 VND and asked him to take him to Tan Binh District. He was on his way to deliver goods and also wanted to go home early, so Mr. Tuyen refused.
However, when An begged for help because he was in a desperate situation due to the pandemic and could not catch a bus, he relented and took him to deliver goods together. An then changed his mind and did not return to Tan Binh, but asked to be taken to the Eastern Bus Station to rent a room to sleep temporarily.
On the way, An lied that he had lost all his documents and could not rent a room, so he asked Mr. Tuyen to let him stay overnight and leave early the next morning. Feeling sorry for him, the motorbike taxi driver took him to a motel in Hiep Binh Phuoc ward, gave him a place to stay, bathed him, cooked him noodles, and made him coffee...
Lieutenant Colonel Tran Van Hieu said that last night, when the special arrest warrant for An was issued, the investigation agency received more than 100 phone calls from people providing information and suspicions. After comparing and determining An's direction of travel, at dawn this morning, the detectives discovered An at a rented house in Hiep Binh Phuoc Ward, Thu Duc City. Dozens of people immediately surrounded the area. When An left the rented house and walked on Highway 13 to catch a car to continue his escape, he was restrained.
Ho Chi Minh City police are clarifying the behavior.Escape from prisonof this death row inmate. Mr. Tuyen and those who were in close contact with An have been tested and quarantined.
Assessing the capture of An and his excellent achievements, preventing many dangers for the people, Major General Le Quoc Hung - Member of the Party Central Committee, Deputy Minister of Public Security, commended the Ho Chi Minh City Police; at the same time, proposed to commend the people who supported in providing information to help arrest the criminal.
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| An walking on the street. Photo: Security camera. |
According to the case file, in early 2014, An - a technical student majoring in programming, was in dire straits because his motorbike and computer were stolen, so he planned to poison his classmate Dat to rob him. After the first failure, on February 26, 2014, he bought a higher dose of drugs for 1.4 million VND and asked Dat to come to his rented house on Cong Hoa Street (Tan Binh District) to instruct him in order to carry out the plan.
An put crushed sleeping pills in a bottle of green tea and gave it to Dat to drink. When the victim was drugged, he thought his friend was dead so he put it in a sack and waited until late at night to take him to Phu My bridge (District 2) and throw him into the river. After committing the crime, he took the victim's iPhone and parked his motorbike in a parking lot near his house.
On February 27, 2014, An called the victim's family, informing them that Dat had been kidnapped and demanding a ransom of VND500 million. Several days later, he repeatedly texted the victim demanding money, but then changed his mind and threw the victim's phone into a canal near his house. Locals later discovered a sack of Dat's body. An's autopsy results showed that the victim died of drowning. An was arrested later and admitted to his crime.
In June 2015, An was sentenced to death by the Ho Chi Minh City People's Court. This sentence was upheld by the appeal court.
