Behind the curtain

Psychological manipulation

Pham Thi Ha (born in 1991) was born into a farming family in Dinh Hung commune, Yen Dinh district, Thanh Hoa province. Her parents died early, and the family had no siblings, so Ha was sent to live with distant relatives. After finishing 11th grade, Ha followed her friends and left home to work far away. With her good looks and clever mouth, Ha was accepted to both learn and work at a massage parlor in Vinh city. After a period of working, Ha met and moved in with La Van C. (born in 1989), who lives in Con Cuong district, to live together as husband and wife.

During the time Ha moved to Con Cuong district, Ha always kept in touch with Ms. Nguyen Thi M. (born in 1986), residing in Vinh city. Ms. M. used to be a regular customer of the massage parlor where Ha used to work. Admiring Ha's skills and personality, even though Ha moved to her husband's house, Ms. M. still often called and texted to confide.

In early September 2018, Ha heard Ms. M. confide that she wanted to quit her job as a hotel manager to return to her hometown to start a business, and asked Ha to research the area near her home to run a motel or hotel. At this time, because she did not have a stable job and the economy was still facing many difficulties, Ha came up with the idea of ​​defrauding and appropriating Ms. M's property.

Through text messages, Pham Thi Ha knew that Ms. M. was very superstitious, so she made up a story that in Con Cuong district there was a fortune teller who was very good at worshiping and could tell what business Ms. M. would do. To gain Ms. M.'s trust, Ha repeatedly made up stories about her family members going to fortune tellers to ward off bad luck and now they were healthy, cured of their illnesses, and not only that, they also had good business. Believing the story that Ha made up, Ms. M. wanted to ask the fortune teller to perform the ceremony.

Knowing that Ms. M. could not come up yet, Ha offered to stand up and perform the ceremony on Ms. M.'s behalf. Trusting her "close friend", Ms. M. sent some money to Ha to perform the ceremony. On the first occasion, to make sure, Ha sent a passenger bus to Ms. M. with a talisman and the lucky number given by the "saints". Not only that, taking advantage of knowing some of Ms. M.'s family's affairs, Ha sent back some information that was said to be "Saints' instructions", making Ms. M. completely trust her and nod to perform the next ceremony without thinking twice.

After knowing that Ms. M. had "trusted her wholeheartedly", Ha began to carry out her first "fraudulent" operations. In September 2018, Ha told Ms. M. to send 4 taels of gold and 5 million VND for the shaman to perform a ceremony to pray for business luck. After being "purified", this amount of property would be returned to Ms. M. to use as business capital. Ms. M. trusted Ha so she went to the gold shop to buy 4 taels of gold for more than 14 million VND. After taking this property from Ms. M., Pham Thi Ha appropriated it for personal expenses without performing a ceremony. When Ms. M. asked, Ha gave the reason "it cannot be used yet, it is still entangled with the negative energy".

Buy refrigerator, phone for worship

Realizing that money fraud was too easy, Pham Thi Ha increasingly found reasons to force Ms. M. to spend her own money on fake ceremonies. From mid-October 2018 to December 2018, Ha repeatedly asked Ms. M. to send more money and gold to make offerings with the hope of helping Ms. M. run her business smoothly and ask for good fortune in trading. Within just 2 months, Ms. M. sent Ha nearly 540 million VND and 1 tael of gold. However, Ha used this money to pay off personal debts and buy things for herself, not to hold a ceremony for Ms. M. as promised.

Not stopping there, in early January 2019, hearing Ms. M confide that she was looking to buy a new refrigerator and phone to use. Ha had the intention of taking possession of it, so she told Ms. M. that after buying it, she should send the car to the altar to perform a ceremony so that it could be used smoothly and luckily. Believing what Ha said was true, Ms. H. hurriedly went to buy both of the above items and sent them to Ha. Instead of performing the ceremony, Ha brought them back to her house to use first. Not stopping there, in early February 2019, Ha informed Ms. M. that the offerings had been completed, but the gods said that all 3 items were needed for the offerings to be easy, so she asked Ms. M. to buy an additional computer, send it to the altar to "perform the ceremony" and then send it back. Hearing that, Ms. M. immediately went to the store to buy an additional Macbook computer and sent it to Ha. After a while, Ms. M. texted Ha to ask her to return the property, but Ha said that the computer had not been worshiped yet so it could not be used and did not return it to Ms. M. Until December 2019, when the Investigation Police Agency searched Pham Thi Ha's house, they discovered all three items were there. The value of the three items was up to nearly 100 million VND.

At the end of August 2019, unable to think of any other reason to deceive Ms. M. Ha used another Zalo account number and impersonated Ha's mother-in-law. Here, the fake account promised to take Ms. M. to the ceremony to ask for a daughter like Ha (at this time Ha was 8 months pregnant). Ms. M. believed these words were true and asked Ha to help with the ceremony. Pham Thi Ha asked Ms. M. to send 13 million VND to buy items for the two ceremonies and 100 million VND in cash for the ceremony. To make the ceremony successful, Ha asked Ms. M. to buy more flower vases, water glasses, water glass holders, bells and wooden fish sets, and incense bowls to send a car to perform the ceremony.

However, every time Ms. M. asked to go up to perform the ceremony herself, Ha refused, on the grounds that the ceremony would lose its sacredness if a stranger sat next to her. Suspecting Pham Thi Ha, Ms. M.'s family coordinated with the police to arrest Ha as soon as she got on the bus to receive the package. After the initial inspection, Ms. M.'s family was extremely surprised when all the assets that Ms. M. bought to perform the ceremony were being used by Ha as if they were her own.

At the authorities, Ha confessed that during the same period, Ha also deceived Ms. Le Thi Ch. (born in 1983), residing in Hoang Mai town, with the above tricks. Knowing that Ms. Ch. intended to open a business, Ha asked the shaman to perform a ceremony for Ms. Ch. to help her business. Trusting that Ha would help him perform a ceremony to pray for luck and fortune, Ms. Le Thi Ch. transferred money to Ha 3 times with a total amount of 45.6 million VND.

When the curtain comes down

At the time Pham Thi Ha was invited to the authorities to assist in the investigation, both victims, Ms. M. and Ms. Ch., still believed that Ha was performing a ritual to remove their bad luck. Only when they heard Ha's confession did the victims realize how absurd the details were, but at that time they did not realize it at all.

In addition to helping the “ritual” to be peaceful, the victims only sent offerings but were not allowed to participate in the worship. Ha also did not allow Ms. M. or Ms. Ch. to see her. According to an investigator, “Ha said that she was pregnant, and if she met a pregnant woman during the ceremony, it would be unlucky, so Ha avoided and did not contact the victims. This made the victims believe more that Ha was truly sincere in her worship.”

It is known that between June 2018 and September 2019, Ms. Nguyen Thi M. transferred money, gold, and assets to Ha 14 times for worship with a total value of nearly 1.3 billion VND. Pham Thi Ha confessed that because she was in debt, had no stable job, and was about to have a small child, she came up with the above trick to earn some capital for business as well as taking care of her child.

At the end of July 2020, the People's Court of Nghe An province opened a trial for Pham Thi Ha on the charge of Fraudulent appropriation of property. At the trial, the prosecutor exercising the right to prosecute determined that the trial of Ha on the above charge was the right person and the right crime. Ha had used deceitful spiritual tricks, defrauding victims into giving money and valuables to herself to make offerings to ward off bad luck, pray for good fortune... then the offerings were returned to create trust but only a small part, the rest Ha blatantly appropriated. Ha committed crimes against two people and many times, so she was required to be severely punished for education.

Based on the case file, the Trial Panel decided to sentence Pham Thi Ha to 15 years in prison for “Fraudulent appropriation of property”. At the same time, the defendant was required to compensate the victims for the amount of money she had appropriated according to regulations.