The old couple bragged that they were the younger brothers of the Deputy Minister of National Defense to defraud billions in Nghe An.

No is the deputy minister's sister, deceiving the family of her "lover"

Nguyen Thi Le is 61 years old, residing in Dien Xuan commune, Dien Chau district. Nguyen Hoai Nam is 69 years old, residing in Nghia Dan town, Nghia Dan district. In 2009, after their divorce, Le and Nam met and got to know each other in Vinh city, then rented a room together and lived together as husband and wife.

During the time living together, Le found out that Nam had savings and wanted to get a pension, so he had the intention of appropriating Nam's money.

Nguyen Thi Le asked for a reduced sentence for her "lover". Photo: Nguyen Duong

Le "bragged" that his brother named Nguyen Van D., who was the Deputy Minister of National Defense, could make a pension plan that cost 100 million VND. Believing Le, Nam withdrew the 100 million VND in savings to give to his "lover". After receiving the money, Le spent it all.

In 2012, Nguyen Hoai Nam repeatedly took Le to his younger brother Nguyen Huu Th's house, residing in Hung Phuc commune, Hung Nguyen district. Here, Nam introduced Le as having a relative who was the Deputy Minister of National Defense, who would be able to get the war invalids, pensions, and Agent Orange benefits. Seeing that Mrs. V. (Mr. Th.'s sister) was old and in poor health, Le "instructed" Mrs. V. to get the disability benefits at a cost of 37 million VND with the commitment that within 2 years she would be able to enjoy the above benefits.

With the same trick, Le also promised to "run" for Mrs. H. (Mr. Th.'s wife) a war invalid regime with a cost of 25 million VND, and a labor disability regime with a cost of 10 million VND. In addition, knowing that Mr. Th. was looking for a job for his son, Nguyen Van Ng., Le promised to help Ng. get a job as a driver at the Ministry of National Defense with a cost of 250 million VND. The total amount of money that Le and Nam appropriated from Mr. Th.'s family was 335 million VND.

After receiving billions from their lover's family but being unable to take care of the matter, Le and Nam were reported to the police by the victims.

The investigation agency determined that, with the same method as above, Nguyen Thi Le and Nguyen Hoai Nam defrauded 15 victims with a total amount of more than 1.5 billion VND (the least amount for one person was 30 million VND, the most amount for one was over 300 million VND). In which, Nguyen Hoai Nam was an accomplice with Nguyen Thi Le in defrauding 8 victims with a total amount of 660 million VND. During the process of receiving and delivering money, Le and Nam only wrote a handwritten receipt with signature or a bank deposit slip.

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In early November, Le and Nam were tried by the People's Court of Nghe An province forcrime of "fraudulent appropriation of property".

Before the witness stand, the “lovers” Le and Nam admitted all their crimes. The defendants said that their difficult circumstances led to their crimes. To commit the fraud and appropriation of property from many people, Nguyen Thi Le also used another name, Nguyen Thi Thao, and Nguyen Hoai Nam used the name Nguyen Quoc Tri.

“Lovers” Nguyen Thi Le and Nguyen Hoai Nam on their court day. Photo: Nguyen Duong

In this case, Nguyen Thi Le played the role of mastermind, and Nguyen Hoai Nam played the role of accomplice.

As a woman of influence, in 2007, Vinh City People’s Court sentenced Nguyen Thi Le to 12 months in prison for “Extortion of property”. After that, Le went to Hanoi to work as a maid and committed the crime of “Theft of property”.

In 2017, the People's Court of Ba Dinh District, Hanoi City sentenced Nguyen Thi Le to 30 months in prison for the above crime. When given the final say, Nguyen Thi Le said that because of her, her "lover" was in trouble with the law, so Le asked for a lighter sentence for Nguyen Hoai Nam.

Unlike Le, Nguyen Hoai Nam requested clarification of Le's behavior of receiving 18 taels of gold to apply for war invalid benefits for Nam and appropriating a motorbike. However, Nguyen Thi Le confessed that during their time living together as husband and wife, Nam voluntarily gave 16 taels of gold for common expenses and the motorbike was their common property.

The investigation agency also determined that Nguyen Hoai Nam could not provide documents reflecting the gold delivery and could not prove that Le had appropriated the motorbike, so there was not enough basis for prosecution.

At the trial, the victims expressed outrage at the fraudulent acts of the two defendants Nguyen Thi Le and Nguyen Hoai Nam, and demanded that the two defendants return all the money they had appropriated.

The panel of judges determined that the actions of the two defendants Nguyen Thi Le and Nguyen Hoai Nam were particularly serious, and that the defendants had used various tricks to defraud and appropriate large sums of money from the victims. However, after committing the crime, the defendants confessed honestly and repented.

For the crime of Fraudulent appropriation of property, Nguyen Thi Le was sentenced to 15 years in prison plus 2 previous sentences that have not been executed, and Nguyen Hoai Nam was sentenced to 11 years in prison.

With this sentence, they will have to pay for the mistakes they caused to the 15 victims, but the sentence of conscience will haunt them for the rest of their lives.