The pain of two wives in a murder case

Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Hien and her father-in-law came to court as representatives of the deceased's relatives. The young woman hardly said anything. She authorized her father-in-law to handle all the arguments in court. Her face was sad, she occasionally hugged her little daughter and then let go, holding her head. It seemed that the testimony of the defendant Tran Van Hoa about the process of causing her husband's death made the young woman's pain of losing her husband even more painful.

The two young children (one 3 years old, one 4 years old) with their heads wrapped in mourning scarves followed their mother to court, but they were not interested in what the adults were arguing about. The two sisters played rock-paper-scissors, the prizes were candies and cakes that the older sister imagined and placed on the table. Every time the younger brother won, he would happily grab the "virtual" candy on the table and put it in his mouth to chew deliciously. Playing this imaginary candy game was boring, so the two children invited each other to go to the hallway and join the children and grandchildren of the defendant Hoa to play with. For them, just having friends to play with was enough, they did not think that their parents were facing each other in court.

Defendant Hoa at the trial. Throughout the trial, Hoa's wife mostly kept her head down on the table as if to avoid the pained gaze of the victim's wife. Photo: Nhu Binh.

Tran Van Hoa (born in 1984), is the 7th child in a family of 8 siblings in Lien Minh commune, Duc Tho district, Ha Tinh province, living by fishing on the Lam river. When he grew up, Hoa escaped to the South to work as a hired hand, but life did not improve, so he had to return, get married, and continue his father's career. Ho Thi Thu Hoai - Hoa's wife (born in 1997), is just over 20 years old and has 3 children, so on Hoai's face there is only a withered, austere and hard-working look. Today, Hoa's wife came to court as a person with related rights and obligations.

At the trial, Tran Van Hoa's criminal behavior was clarified: On the morning of October 1, 2018, Tran Van Hoa and his wife, his brother and his wife, and his friend and his wife sailed a boat to Lam River to catch clams. The three boats entered the alluvial area of ​​Hamlet 5, Hung Nhan Commune and met Ho Duc Troi (born in 1994) and his relatives carrying stakes to fence off the area to catch clams. Thinking that Hoa's group had encroached on the alluvial area managed by his family, Troi chased after their boat.

Mr. Tran Van Sinh - Hoa's brother, sympathized and admitted to catching some clams and showed the basket of clams to Troi. Troi smashed the basket of clams against the side of the boat and threw it into the river. Seeing that his brother had lost the basket of clams, Hoa told his wife to turn the boat around, picked up a piece of wood from the river, hit Troi and chased him off his brother's boat.

Mr. Troi said he would wait for his friend's boat to come back, but Hoa told him to jump into the river. When his friend's boat got closer, Mr. Troi jumped over. At this time, Troi and Hoa stood facing each other on the two boats. Troi picked up a wooden stake from the boat and raised it to hit Hoa, but missed. Hoa held an electric shock rod used for fishing and pointed it at Troi, causing the victim to be hit by a strong electric current and fall into the river.

Seeing this, Hoa and his wife drove the boat away. Mr. Troi was taken to the emergency room but died later due to respiratory and circulatory failure due to electric shock.

Knowing that Mr. Troi had died, Tran Van Hoa went to the police station the next day to surrender and confess his crime. Having lost the breadwinner and having to take care of three children (the eldest born in 2012, the youngest born in 2017) alone, Hoai - Hoa's wife still tried to borrow money to compensate Mr. Troi's family 40 million VND in hopes of reducing her husband's sentence.

Throughout the trial, she just bowed her head on the table as if avoiding the victim's wife's gaze. Only when the jury asked did Hoai stand up and give the briefest answer. The investigation agency determined that Ho Thi Thu Hoai was the person who drove the boat carrying Tran Van Hoa to Mr. Sinh's boat to prevent Mr. Troi from beating Mr. Sinh. After Hoa used an electric shock to hit Mr. Troi, causing the victim to fall off the boat, Hoai started the boat engine to take Hoa home. Because Hoa did not see or know that Hoa used an electric shock to hit Mr. Troi, there was no basis to prosecute Ho Thi Thu Hoai.

At the trial, defendant Tran Van Hoa admitted his crime. Hoa said that because he could not determine the fishing area, he went into the mudflat area managed by Mr. Troi's family to catch clams. When Mr. Troi objected, Hoa and his two boatmates left, but because Mr. Troi smashed and threw away Hoa's brother's clam basket and threatened him, the defendant could not control himself. The defendant did not intend to take Mr. Troi's life.

When given his last words, Tran Van Hoa apologized to the victim's family and hoped to receive leniency from the law.

The panel of judges determined that Tran Van Hoa’s actions were extremely serious, and that the crime was of a hooligan nature. Considering the case as a whole, the panel sentenced Tran Van Hoa to 19 years in prison; ordered the defendant to compensate the victim 170 million VND, and provide for the upbringing of Mr. Troi’s two children, each receiving 1 million VND/month.

The trial ended, defendant Hoa trudged back to the prison by car. Ms. Hien and Ms. Hoai each took their small children and left the court. The two young women faced many difficulties without their husbands, having to shoulder the dual roles of being both father and mother, earning money, taking care of and raising their children…