Former Saigon Co.op Chairman Diep Dung sentenced to 2 years in prison for appropriating confidential documents
For revealing confidential information to the person he was investigating, a former officer working at the Economic Security Department of Ho Chi Minh City Police had to pay a very high price.
After a day of trial and deliberation, late on April 28, the Ho Chi Minh City People's Court sentenced former police officer Nguyen Hoai Bac (37 years old, former officer working at the Economic Security Department - Ho Chi Minh City Police), Le Thi Phuong Hong (42 years old, self-employed) and Diep Dung (53 years old, former Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Ho Chi Minh City Union of Commercial Cooperatives - Saigon Co.op).
Accordingly, the People's Court sentenced defendant Nguyen Hoai Bac to 5 years in prison; defendant Le Thi Phuong Hong to 6 years in prison for the crime of "Intentionally revealing state secrets"; defendant Diep Dung to 2 years in prison for the crime of "Intentionally revealing state secrets"."appropriation of state secret documents".
According to the prosecution, at the end of September 2020, the Investigation Security Agency - Ho Chi Minh City Police invited Mr. Diep Dung to work with him about the violations that occurred at Saigon Co.op. Through the investigation, Mr. Dung confessed that someone provided information during the process of checking and verifying the source of the crime denunciation that occurred at Saigon Co.op.
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| Mr. Diep Dung in court. Photo:Duy Binh (VnE) |
Based on Diep Dung's testimony, Ho Chi Minh City Police worked with officers participating in the investigation team to verify the violations at Saigon Co.op. Defendant Nguyen Hoai Bac (member of the verification team) confessed that he had provided information about the verification process to Le Thi Phuong Hong (who lived with defendant Bac as husband and wife - PV).
Hong reported to Mr. Diep Dung some information contained in the progress report and the results of the verification process of the violation case at Saigon Co.op, which is confidential information according to the law.
Hong confessed that around the beginning of September 2020, when Bac came to the house to sleep, he brought with him a set of documents showing the results of working with many people about violations at Saigon Co.op, including documents showing the results of working with Mr. Diep Dung and Ms. Ho My Hoa (Finance Director of Saigon Co.op).
Ms. Hong viewed, took photos and recorded documents on verification results, collected documents, evidence, and directed work with relevant people when summoned by the investigation agency. Then, Hong provided this information to Mr. Diep Dung.
On September 9, 2020, Hong and Mr. Diep Dung met to exchange information. That evening, Mr. Diep Dung's driver continued to meet Hong and gave her an envelope containing 100 million VND and a few small notes in which Mr. Dung asked Ms. Hong to pay attention to some other contents.
The investigation agency determined that in the documents Hong provided to Mr. Diep Dung, there were confidential documents, which were the initial results of verifying the violations that occurred at Saigon Co.op.
Throughout the investigation, Mr. Diep Dung kept claiming his innocence. Mr. Diep Dung asserted that he did not know who Le Thi Phuong Hong was and was completely passive in Ms. Hong's contact with him.
