Forging national identity cards and bank accounts to commit fraud.

On September 12th, the People's Court of Nghe An province opened a trial to hear the case against defendant Nguyen Tat Thang (born in 1988), residing in Tam Quang commune, Tuong Duong district, for the following crimes: Fraudulent appropriation of property; Forgery of documents of agencies and organizations; Use of forged documents of agencies and organizations; and Illegally buying and selling information about bank accounts.

The defendants: Nguyen Van Tuan (born 1990, residing in Tam Quang commune), Phung Anh Tuan (born 1990, residing in Thua Thien Hue province), and Nguyen Minh Ha (born 1992, residing in Bac Ninh province) were tried for the crime of forging documents of agencies and organizations.

The defendants, Hoang Thai Bao (born in 1996, residing in Thai Nguyen province), Pham Do Anh Tuan (born in 1988, residing in Gia Lai province), and La Xuan Thien (born in 1997, residing in Thanh Hoa province), are being tried for illegally buying and selling bank account information.

Specifically, defendant Le Van Thang (born in 2000, residing in Thua Thien Hue province) is being tried for the crime of fraud and appropriation of property.

According to the indictment, in order to have money to spend, from the beginning of 2023 to December 2023, Nguyen Tat Thang hired Nguyen Minh Ha to forge 31 citizen identity cards to open 117 Techcombank bank accounts. Ha was paid 34 million VND by Thang for his services.

Subsequently, Nguyen Tat Thang hired Le Van Thang to use a referral code from Thang's bank account to redeem vouchers and promotional rewards to pay for electricity and water bills, thereby defrauding Techcombank of over 17 million VND. Of this amount, Le Van Thang, as an accomplice with Nguyen Tat Thang, embezzled nearly 13 million VND.

In addition, Nguyen Tat Thang also hired Nguyen Van Tuan to forge 1,740 citizen identification cards and open 527 Vietinbank bank accounts for a fee of nearly 39 million VND.

Thang hired Phung Anh Tuan to forge 1,195 citizen identification cards, and then open 1,036 bank accounts for a fee of 40 million VND.

After opening 2,232 Vietinbank bank accounts, Nguyen Tat Thang, along with Pham Do Anh Tuan, resold them to Hoang Thai Bao for 50,000 VND per account/phone SIM card, using La Xuan Thien as an intermediary for the money transaction.

The investigating agency determined that the total amount of money the suspects earned from selling bank account information was over 111 million VND. Of this, Thien profited 1.3 million VND; Nguyen Tat Thang illegally profited over 99 million VND; Bao illegally profited over 22 million VND; and Pham Do Anh Tuan illegally profited over 6.7 million VND.

At the trial, the defendants admitted to the crimes as charged in the indictment. During the investigation, Techcombank did not request any civil compensation from the defendants.

After considering the role of each defendant in the case, the panel of judges sentenced defendant Nguyen Tat Thang to 9 months imprisonment for fraud and appropriation of property, 42 months imprisonment for forging documents of agencies and organizations, 39 months imprisonment for using forged documents of agencies and organizations, and 30 months imprisonment for illegally buying and selling bank account information. The combined sentence requires this defendant to serve a total of 10 years imprisonment.

For the group of defendants convicted of forging documents of agencies and organizations, the court sentenced defendant Nguyen Van Tuan to 40 months in prison; defendants Nguyen Minh Ha and Phung Anh Tuan received 39 months in prison.

For the group of defendants convicted of illegally buying and selling bank account information, the court sentenced Hoang Thai Bao to 39 months in prison, Pham Do Anh Tuan to 30 months in prison, and La Xuan Thien to 24 months in prison.

Defendant Le Van Thang was sentenced to 6 months in prison but given a suspended sentence for the crime of fraud and appropriation of property.

Tran Vu