Trial of female police officer accused of fraud postponed

(Baonghean.vn) -On April 25, many victims in the property fraud case left disappointed because the Trial Council decided to postpone the trial of the property fraud case against defendant Tran Thi Ngoc Ha, a former police officer of Nghe An province.

The reason for the postponement of the trial is that a victim has just died in a traffic accident, so the authorities need to carry out some other necessary legal procedures. This is the third time this trial has been postponed for different reasons.

According to the case file, Tran Thi Ngoc Ha (born in 1980), with permanent residence in Truong Thi ward, Vinh city (Nghe An), is an officer of Nghe An provincial police, took advantage of the trust of friends and relatives to commit fraud and appropriate property. From June 2007 to October 2011, Ha created for herself the cover of a tycoon, drove a billion-dollar car, did big business, and owned many plots of land in Vinh city, Cua Lo town, etc.

After gaining people's trust, Ha began to use tricks to borrow money at high interest rates, borrow money to reverse bank contracts, buy land to borrow billions from many people. To get money, Ha even used tricks to sell fake land, using 1 land use right certificate to sell to many people and mortgage it to the bank,... With the above tricks, in a short time, Ha appropriated nearly 24 billion VND from 13 victims. Many people were brothers, friends, colleagues of Ha, some were cheated out of a few hundred million, some were cheated out of nearly 6 billion VND,...

On December 12, 2011, when he was officially bankrupt and his victims were demanding money, Ha asked to leave the industry, went to the police headquarters to surrender, and asked for protection from the victims' intense pursuit. Ha confessed that he had used the money he had embezzled to buy land, pay off debts, and for personal expenses. However, at the police station, Ha could not prove where he had bought the land, who he had paid the debt to, and when. The investigation agency determined that Ha had compensated the victims for nearly 2.8 billion VND and was embezzling more than 21 billion VND.

During the borrowing process, Ha's husband, Nguyen Truong Trung, signed the loan papers of 3 people three times for a total of more than 7.2 billion VND. However, the investigation agency determined that Nguyen Truong Trung signed the civil contracts because he trusted his wife, with the purpose of borrowing money, not knowing that before borrowing, Ha had intentionally appropriated other people's money, so there was not enough basis to prosecute Nguyen Truong Trung.

Ha's behavior was prosecuted for the crime of Fraudulent appropriation of property under Clause 4, Article 139 of the Penal Code with a penalty of 12 to 20 years or life imprisonment.

Nguyen Khoa