Mr. Tram Be was arrested

Former Sacombank leader Tram Be was accused of wrongdoing, colluding with Pham Cong Danh to cause losses of thousands of billions of dong.

On August 1, the Department of Investigation Police on Economic Crimes and Corruption (C46 - Ministry of Public Security) temporarily detained Mr. Tram Be (58 years old, former Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chairman of the Board of Credit of Sacombank) for the act of intentionally violating state regulations on economic management causing serious consequences.

Accused of the same act, former credit council member and former General Director of Sacombank - Mr. Phan Huy Khang - was also detained for 4 months.

Authorities are searching the two suspects' former residence and workplace in Saigon.

This move was made by the Ministry of Public Security in the second phase of the investigation into the Pham Cong Danh case.Former Chairman of the Board of Directors of Vietnam Construction Bank - VNCB, Thien Thanh Group)causing a total loss of more than 15,000 billion VND.

Also related to Mr. Danh, yesterday the Ministry of Public Security prosecuted Pham Thi Trang (aka Trang Pho Nui, 43 years old) on charges of helping Mr. Danh mobilize money from many large customers, causing a loss of thousands of billions of VND for VNCB bank.

Mr. Tram Be at the shareholders' meeting in the middle of last year.

According to the initial investigation, Mr. Tram Be and a series of Sacombank officials deliberately circumvented regulations to help Mr. Danh borrow money from the bank.

Specifically, in April 2013, to have money to pay off previous loans at the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV), Mr. Danh and his subordinates met with Mr. Tram Be to request a loan of 1,800 billion VND.

Knowing that Mr. Danh could not directly borrow money from VNCB, Mr. Be agreed to lend money with collateral being VNCB's deposits at Sacombank and assigned his subordinates to implement it.

Mr. Danh then assigned Phan Thanh Mai (General Director of VNCB), Mai Huu Khuong (34 years old, member of the Board of Directors) to prepare the security money and make 6 sets of legal documents of 6 companies (established by Mr. Danh) to borrow money under the real estate business plan. The directors of these companies are mostly security guards, drivers... of Thien Thanh Group hired to stand in their names.

The investigation agency determined that in this transaction, Mr. Tram Be had a policy of "disbursing first and supplementing documents later", so in just one day, the directors of Sacombank's branches transferred a total of 1,800 billion VND to 6 companies of Mr. Danh.

With this amount, Mr. Danh paid off the debt of 1,700 billion VND to BIDV - the loan to transfer 5 land lots belonging to the high-rise Trade and Service Complex project at Chi Lang Stadium, Da Nang.

As of February 24,Mr. Tram Be and his son Tram Khai Hoa have a petitionHe resigned from his positions at Sacombank. He also has a son named Tran Trong Ngan, who was kidnapped by gangster Binh Kiem (real name Pham Duc Binh) in 2005 and demanded 10 million USD in ransom.

Mr. Tram Be is of Chinese origin.He invested and became a member of the Board of Directors of Southern Bank in 2004. By mid-2012, he and a series of leaders from Southern Bank were elected to the Board of Directors and Executive Board of Sacombank. After that, he became Vice Chairman of Sacombank.

According to VNE