Transgender woman scams 1.5 billion VND by speaking both male and female voices.

On August 24th, the Investigation Police Department of Nghe An province announced that it had issued a decision to initiate a criminal case, indict and detain Pham Thi Phuong Loan (born in 1990, residing in Vu Thu district, Thai Binh province) for investigation into the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property".

The suspect is Pham Thi Phuong Loan. Photo: NP

Pham Thi Phuong Loan has been accused by the Nghe An Provincial Police Investigation Agency of defrauding Nguyen Thi Van (residing in Nghi Xuan commune, Nghi Loc district) of 1.5 billion VND.

According to the police, Pham Thi Phuong Loan was originally a woman who later underwent gender reassignment surgery from female to male. After the surgery, Loan could speak in both male and female voices. Using this advantage, Loan began looking for ways to commit fraud.

In late 2017, Ms. Nguyen Thi Van used a Facebook account named "Khanh Van" to post photos and a status update seeking a person named Anh to recover bail money intended to prevent her from absconding while traveling in South Korea. Loan, who was using a Facebook account named "Thomas Ngo" at the time, read this post and created a Facebook account named "Trang Giay To" to message and chat with Ms. Van.

Loan introduced herself as Khánh and said she had a friend named Ngô Đức Minh who worked at the Consulate and could help Vân get her money back. However, Vân was unaware that the person named Minh was actually Loan.

On October 16, 2017, Loan texted Ms. Van saying she had found Anh's address but demanded 60 million VND before she would provide it. Because she didn't have the money, Ms. Van refused.

Not giving up on her plan to scam Ms. Vân, on October 21, 2017, knowing that Ms. Vân was in Hanoi, Loan, posing as Minh, arranged a meeting and promised to lend Ms. Vân 60 million VND to transfer to Khánh. When Ms. Vân called Khánh, Khánh confirmed that he had received the money.

A few days later, Minh claimed he needed money urgently and asked Ms. Van to repay the debt. Although she was scammed out of 60 million dong, Ms. Van didn't suspect anything. Khanh then tried to persuade Ms. Van to go to South Korea, promising to give her Anh's address, but she refused because she didn't have the money.

Not stopping there, Loan continued to plot to swindle money from Ms. Van a second time. After several conversations, knowing that Ms. Van intended to handle the procedures for someone else to travel to South Korea, Loan again used the name Khanh to introduce another person named Nguyen Thanh Be (actually Loan) who could handle the procedures for people traveling to South Korea.

Trusting Bé, Ms. Vân found 16 people who wanted to travel to South Korea and asked Bé to handle the paperwork for them. Bé demanded that Ms. Vân pay 6,500 USD per person, including 1,500 USD as a deposit and 5,000 USD as a guarantee against absconding, and urged Ms. Vân to submit the clients' documents in time for the flight on December 19, 2017.

On December 9, 2017, Ms. Van transferred $16,000 USD to the account of Nguyen Thanh Be (Loan found Ms. Be's ID card and created an account for her). On December 11, 2017, Ms. Van brought the documents to Hanoi to send to Be, but Loan asked someone else to pick them up on her behalf.

A few days later, Loan urged Ms. Van to pay the remaining amount, and Ms. Van transferred 49,500 USD to an account under the name Pham Thi Phuong Loan. On December 18th, Ms. Van transferred another 45,540,000 VND, which was the penalty fee because two members of the group canceled their flight to South Korea. In total, Loan defrauded Ms. Van of approximately 1.5 billion VND.

After receiving the full amount, Loan closed her social media accounts and turned off her phone. Unable to contact Loan, Ms. Vân realized she had been scammed and reported the incident to the Nghe An Provincial Police.