'Beautiful woman' sets trap to swindle billions of dong.
Under the guise of a successful businesswoman, Au Thi Thanh Hang frequently used a glamorous image and claimed to have a knack for "speculating" on land. From there, the "beauty queen" easily approached investors to swindle billions of dong…
Shocked when the "beautiful woman" turned off her phone.
Nearly three years have passed since the trial of Au Thi Thanh Hang (born in 1996), residing in Vinh Tan ward, Vinh City, Nghe An province, but Ms. PTMH, residing in Mai Dong ward, Hoang Mai district, Hanoi, has only recovered a mere 350 million VND, while the amount of money she was defrauded of totals billions of VND.
Having met Hang through her ex-husband, Ms. PTMH admitted to being impressed by Hang's extravagant lifestyle. With the image of a stylish, lavish party girl who splurges on designer items and expensive entertainment, many people were unaware that Hang actually lacked a stable job.
To build her image as a businesswoman on social media, Hang always posted pictures of herself partying at luxurious locations, driving luxury cars, and living in high-end apartments. Claiming to have a "god-given" ability to spot prime land plots, Hang frequently shared information about her highly profitable land speculation ventures, earning admiration from many. Taking advantage of the land boom, Hang encouraged many people to invest and profit.
Reportedly, at the end of 2021, seeing that Hang had a lot of money and had bought a new Mercedes car, Ms. PTMH messaged her to inquire about her health and ask what Hang did to have so much money. Hang said that she worked in real estate, specializing in buying and selling land. Seeing this, Ms. PTMH suggested that when a good piece of land became available, they could pool their capital to start a business together, and Au Thi Thanh Hang agreed.
At that time, having some spare cash, Ms. PTMH did not hesitate to invest in land. However, by April 2022, Hang repeatedly used excuses such as not having transferred the land title or that customers had not transferred the money to refuse to repay Ms. PTMH whenever the deadline arrived. Around the beginning of May 2022, Ms. PTMH was shocked when she could not contact Hang, only receiving a text message from the "beautiful woman" claiming she was traveling abroad and therefore unable to answer calls. Noticing Hang's suspicious financial behavior, Ms. PTMH's family investigated and discovered that Hang had fabricated a scheme to collect money from land speculation to deceive them. With sufficient evidence, Ms. PTMH filed a complaint with the Criminal Investigation Department of the Nghe An Provincial Police.
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On May 16, 2022, the Criminal Police Department of Nghe An Provincial Police temporarily detained Au Thi Thanh Hang (born in 1996), residing in Vinh Tan Ward, Vinh City, for investigation into the crime of "Fraud and appropriation of property." Many acquaintances of Au Thi Thanh Hang were shocked to hear that this "beautiful woman" had been temporarily detained by the authorities for investigation.
Scam involving 7.1 billion VND.
During the investigation, Au Thi Thanh Hang confessed that due to not having a stable job and wanting money to play online reward-based games on social media, she came up with the idea of defrauding investors to steal their assets.
Hang's first scam took place in early 2022. Hang informed Ms. PTMH that a prime piece of land in the center of Vinh City was for sale for only 2.4 billion VND. Confident in her "sharp eye," Hang assured Ms. PTMH that the land could be rented out for 80-90 million VND per month. To gain the victim's trust, Hang suggested that each party contribute half for speculative profit, which Ms. PTMH agreed to. From January 5, 2022, Ms. PTMH transferred 1.4 billion VND to Hang.
Next, Au Thi Thanh Hang went to a photocopy shop to get a sample deposit contract for the transfer of land use rights, then wrote down the information of the deposit recipient herself and signed as both the depositor and the deposit recipient. After that, she took a photo and sent it to Ms. PTMH for review.
Furthermore, Hang used Facebook to order a fake land use certificate from an unknown person, claiming she was the owner of the land, for 10 million VND. After receiving the fake certificate from the courier, Hang took a picture of it and sent it to Ms. PTMH to convince her that she had successfully purchased the land. Hang then used all the money she obtained to gamble online and lost it all.
Realizing that Ms. PTMH had completely trusted her, Au Thi Thanh Hang continued to deceive Ms. PTMH. Using similar tactics, Hang asked Ms. PTMH to transfer money three times to invest in the purchase of three plots of land in Vinh City, appropriating a total of 4.5 billion VND.
Furthermore, at the end of April 2022, after using all the money she had stolen from Ms. PTMH to gamble and losing it all, Au Thi Thanh Hang continued to deceive Ms. PTMH into investing money in land in Ha Tinh. However, Ms. PTMH did not invest because she no longer had the money. To gain Ms. PTMH's trust and encourage her to transfer more money, Hang lied, claiming she had already made a deposit, was currently short 1.5 billion VND, and asked Ms. PTMH to help her borrow the money. On April 27, 2022, Ms. PTMH transferred 1.4 billion VND to Hang. The total amount of money Au Thi Thanh Hang defrauded and stole from Ms. PTMH is 7.1 billion VND.
The beautiful woman pleaded guilty.
In late November 2022, the People's Court of Nghe An province held a first-instance trial to hear the case against Au Thi Thanh Hang for the crimes of "Fraudulent appropriation of property" and "Using forged seals or documents of agencies or organizations," as stipulated in Point a, Clause 4, Article 174; and Point b, Clause 3, Article 341 of the Penal Code.
It is known that Hang was the youngest child in her family. Blessed with beauty and a quick wit, she dropped out of school after only completing high school to pursue business. However, lacking experience in the business world, Hang returned after a few years of wandering and decided to get married. She thought family life would help her mature, but due to impulsive thinking and differing lifestyles, she left after marriage.
In her free time, wanting to make money online, Hang joined many online gambling and virtual investment sites. Only when she could no longer afford to pay did she come up with a scheme to create a cover to attract investments.
At the trial, when asked why she had deceived Ms. PTMH four or five times, Hang only bowed her head and mumbled an explanation, saying that she was heavily in debt at the time and wanted to swindle as much money as possible. It is known that immediately after her arrest, Hang persuaded her family to pay Ms. PTMH 350 million VND to… reach a settlement.
Before the court, Au Thi Thanh Hang confessed to all her crimes. Based on the circumstances of the case, the court sentenced the defendant Au Thi Thanh Hang to life imprisonment for the crimes of "Fraudulent appropriation of property" and "Using forged seals or documents of agencies or organizations". She was also ordered to return 6.8 billion VND to the victim.
