A group of young men slashed a man for 'not drinking beer when offered'

On June 27, the People's Court of Nghe An province opened a criminal appeal hearing following the appeal for a reduced sentence of Nguyen Van Tien (born in 1986, residing in Tam Hop commune, Quy Hop district) for the crimes of Intentionally causing injury and Illegal possession of explosives.

Defendant Nguyen Van Tien at the appeal hearing. Photo: Tran Vu

According to the investigation agency’s documents, on the evening of April 26, 2018, Tien and a group of friends went to sing karaoke in Nghia Xuan commune. Here, Tien’s group met another group of young men, including Ho Ba Hoang and Lam. A friend in Hoang’s group invited Tien to sing and drink beer, but Tien refused, “I won’t drink beer with you.”

After that, the two groups got into an argument and a fight. After being stopped by everyone, both sides stopped and left the restaurant. At this time, Tien's group went to another restaurant to drink water, and not long after, they received news that Lam's group was coming down to fight.

Hearing that, Tien's group prepared weapons including knives, iron pipes and wooden sticks to attack the other group. At 11pm the same day, when they saw Lam passing by, Tien immediately called on his accomplices to attack. Being beaten, Lam's group ran away in two groups. Ho Ba Hoang did not follow any group, but jumped onto a truck that was moving slowly from Quy Hop to Nghia Dan on Highway 48 to escape.

After chasing and beating two groups of young men who had run away, Tien's group turned back and saw Ho Ba Hoang jumping off the truck. Seeing this, Tien and his accomplices ran to beat him with knives and iron pipes, slashing many parts of Hoang's body, causing the victim to fall unconscious on the road.

Hoang was taken to the hospital by everyone. Afterwards, Hoang's biological father filed a petition to prosecute and request an assessment of the disability rate on Ho Ba Hoang's body. According to the investigation agency's assessment, Hoang's disability rate was 42%.

During the investigation and search of Nguyen Van Tien's residence, police discovered and seized 6 bars of compressed powder suspected to be industrial explosives and 6 metal tubes with electric wires suspected to be detonators.

At the first instance trial held by the People's Court of Quy Hop district in March 2019, Nguyen Van Tien was sentenced to 7 years in prison for intentionally causing injury and 2 years in prison for illegally storing explosives. 4 other defendants received different sentences for intentionally causing injury.

Nguyen Van Tien appealed for a lighter sentence, believing that the sentence was too high. In court, giving the reason for the reduced sentence, Tien said that at the first instance trial, he was confused and did not admit his guilt. Now, he sees that what he did was wrong and violated the law, so he asked the court to reduce his sentence.

Considering that the appeal was well-founded, the panel decided to partially accept Tien's appeal. The decision amended the first instance judgment, sentencing Nguyen Van Tien to 6 years in prison for Intentional Infliction of Injury and 1 year in prison for Illegal Possession of Explosives.

The total penalty imposed on the defendant is 7 years in prison.