Two sentences for foster mother who pawned her son's car to sell drugs
(Baonghean.vn) - Phung Thi Hoa (residing in Thai Hoa town) borrowed her adopted son's car to transport ore, but due to greed for high profits, she "mortgaged" her son's car to get money to trade drugs. While serving a 20-year sentence for drug use, she continued to appear in court on another charge.
On February 3, 2021, the People's Court of Nghe An province brought defendant Phung Thi Hoa (born 1959), residing in Quang Phong ward, Thai Hoa town, Nghe An province, to trial for the crime of“Abuse of trustappropriation of property
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| Defendant Phung Thi Hoa at trial. Photo: An Quynh. |
After borrowing the car, Ms. Hoa immediately asked her biological son, Mr. Nguyen Van Phu, to take the car home. Due to lack of money to get the ore, Ms. Hoa came up with the idea of pawning the car borrowed from her adopted son to get the money. After discussing with the local lender, Ms. Hoa told Phu to drive the car and receive 300 million VND in cash, and she would come to sign the debt paper later.
About 3 or 4 days later, Ms. Hoa went to Thong Thu border gate (Que Phong district, Nghe An province) to contact to buy ore and met a man she did not know. This man invited Hoa to pool money to buy and sell drugs with him. Seeing the high profit, Ms. Hoa came up with the idea of using the money from "mortgaging" her adopted son's car to buy "goods". After pooling money, Ms. Hoa went to Thong Thu border gate many times to look for the man who contributed capital but could not find him.
On the scheduled date to return the car, Kien called his adoptive mother. Afraid that his son would find out, Mrs. Hoa lied that the car was stuck in Laos and extended the rental for another month for 25 million VND. To make his adopted son believe her "cover", Mrs. Hoa immediately transferred 10 million VND to Kien.
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| After the trial, defendant Hoa was handed over to the police to serve the sentence. Photo: An Quynh |
On August 5, 2019, when she could not find the man who shared the money for drug trafficking, Ms. Hoa participated in another drug case with the hope of getting some profit but was arrested by Lao Cai Provincial Police and sentenced to 20 years in prison for "Illegal drug trafficking".
After being tried by Lao Cai police, defendant Phung Thi Hoa was detained and continued to be tried by Nghe An People's Court for the crime of "Abuse of trust to appropriate property".
At the trial, after many times of questioning, the defendant admitted to her crime. Considering the aggravating and mitigating circumstances such as the defendant having a bad personal history, however, the defendant had also been awarded the Youth Volunteer Medal by the President, the panel of judges decided to sentence Phung Thi Hoa to 13 years in prison for the crime of "Abuse of property appropriation". Combined with the previous sentence, the total time the defendant served was 30 years in prison.
