Former female director in Nghe An defrauded many workers, embezzling nearly 3 billion VND

On March 31, Nghe An Provincial People's Court opened a first-instance criminal trial of defendant Tran Thi Thu (born 1983), from Huong Khe district (Ha Tinh), residing in Nghi Kim commune (Vinh city) for the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property".

Knowing the high demand for overseas labor export among young people from Nghe An and Ha Tinh provinces, around the beginning of May 2018, through acquaintances, Tran Thi Thu asked a company in Hanoi to establish a representative office in Vinh City.

Tran Thi Thu. Photo: Tran Vu

During the process of operating and signing contracts, Thu always acted as the director of the office in Vinh. In early October 2018, Thu terminated her office because she found that the office did not meet her goals.

On October 5, 2018, Thu established Future Nghe An International Education System Company Limited.

Although both the Vinh Office and Future Company do not have the function of recruiting workers to work and send people abroad; Tran Thi Thu also did not sign any joint venture or association contract with any domestic or foreign agency or organization that has the function of recruiting workers to work and travel abroad, Thu still deliberately defrauded the workers.

To gain the trust of those who want to go abroad, Thu used social networking sites such as Facebook and Zalo to post job orders to recruit workers to work at Samsung Company in Korea, Canada... and receive procedures to travel to some European countries.

Thu asked office staff, recruiters and collaborators to copy the orders and post them on their social media pages and recruitment sites. Tran Thi Thu also rented a location and teachers to organize Korean and English classes for the workers.

With the above tricks, from April 2018 to May 2019, Tran Thi Thu directly signed agreements, received documents, and received deposits from 64 people to complete procedures for them to work and travel abroad, appropriating a total amount of nearly 3 billion VND.

In court, the defendant admitted to the crime as charged in the indictment. Regarding the money he had appropriated from the victims, Thu stated that he used it to rent an office, renovate the office, buy computers, air conditioners, buy a car on installments (later sold to pay off bank debt), pay salaries to employees and collaborators, and spent it all on personal expenses.

For the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property", Tran Thi Thu was sentenced to 18 years in prison. The defendant was forced to return the money she had appropriated from the victims.

Tran Vu