Behind the ruthless knife attack

Swinging the knife out of "inertia".

Due to difficult family finances and the need to support his wife and children, Nguyen Hai Phi (born in 1995), residing in Nam Thuong commune, Nam Dan district, had to seek work as a factory worker in the Nam Cam Industrial Park (Nghi Xa commune, Nghi Loc district).

At approximately 9:30 PM on March 28, 2017, while preparing to go to bed, Nguyen Hai Phi heard Le Anh T. (born in 1998) and Nguyen Ngoc H. (born in 1995), both residing in Nam Linh commune, Nam Dan district, making noise on the first floor of the boarding house...

Annoyed by the noise from his neighbors, Nguyen Hai Phi went downstairs to tell them to be quiet. Before going down, Phi didn't forget to grab a fruit knife from his room for self-defense.

Upon arriving, Phi and H. got into an argument. Losing control, Phi grabbed a knife and repeatedly stabbed T., who had no time to react and collapsed to the floor.

Seeing his friend being stabbed, H. intervened but was also stabbed three times in the head, neck, and face by Nguyen Hai Phi.

Immediately after the incident, many people rushed out to intervene and take the victims to the hospital. However, due to the severity of his injuries, T. died on the spot, while Nguyen Ngoc H. suffered injuries resulting in 14% disability.

After committing the crime, Nguyen Hai Phi drove back to his hometown. Encouraged and advised by many friends and relatives, in the early morning of March 29, Phi went to the local police station to surrender and confess to his actions.

At the police investigation agency, Phi confessed that he was so angry about the noise that T. and H. had caused that he wanted to go down and teach his neighbors a lesson, and that his actions were simply "instinctive".

Tears of women

The victim, Le Anh T., passed away at the age of 18. He was the youngest son in his family. His father died early, and his mother single-handedly raised T. and his brother.

Out of love for her mother, who was struggling and suffering from cancer without money for medication, T. went to work as a factory worker in the Nam Cam industrial zone after graduating from high school.

The trial of Nguyen Hai Phi was held by the People's Court of Nghe An province in mid-September 2017. Nguyen Hai Phi was prosecuted for murder.

Although present at the trial, Ms. Huong, the mother of the victim Le Anh T., had to authorize her brother to participate in the proceedings as the victim's legal representative. Her lung cancer and the pain of losing her son have left her frail, weak, and older than her age. She sat silently in one place, tears streaming down her sorrowful face.

When questioned by the judges about the motive for the crime and how he justified his act of murder, Phi claimed that he wanted to tell Mr. T. and Mr. H. to stop and tell them to be quiet while riding their motorbikes into the boarding house, disturbing other residents' rest. As for pulling out the knife and stabbing the victims, he said it was "due to instinct."

During the trial, the representative of the Prosecutor's Office argued that Phi was not truthful in his statements, and that his testimony at the investigative agency and at the trial were inconsistent.

The presiding judge also affirmed that Phi's actions were thuggish in nature, as he repeatedly stabbed Mr. T. and Mr. H. Fortunately, someone intervened in time; otherwise, Mr. H. would likely not have survived. The fact that Mr. H. did not die was beyond the defendant's intention.

Sitting in the row below, alongside the victim's mother, were two women in a state of distress. One was the defendant's mother, the other his young wife. But in response to the worry and pain of the mother and wife, Phi's face was cold and emotionless. The defendant Phi's coldness throughout that morning only intensified the women's sorrow.

Sitting a row away from Phi, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Tuyet (Phi's mother) and her daughter-in-law held their sleeping baby son while talking to Phi. The conversation was interrupted several times by the tears of the two women, but Mrs. Tuyet kept urging her son: "What's done is done. You've already committed murder, so please turn around and apologize to them..."

However, Phi remained indifferent and said nothing.

Phi's wife, barely in her twenties, could only sit and watch her husband, unable to utter a word. During the trial, the young wife lingered outside the courtroom, searching for a cool spot for her son to sleep soundly, only entering to see her husband when the court adjourned for deliberation.

Reportedly, on the day her husband committed the crime, she and her husband's family went to great lengths to compensate the victim's family with 120 million VND. On the first and fifteenth days of the lunar month, Phi's family would visit to offer incense and apologize to the deceased.

The court determined that Nguyen Hai Phi's actions were of a thuggish nature, of an exceptionally serious nature, as he senselessly took the lives of others, committed crimes against multiple people, and posed a danger to society… Considering the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, the court sentenced Nguyen Hai Phi to 20 years in prison for the crime of "Murder".

Regarding civil liability, the court ordered defendant Nguyen Hai Phi to compensate the family of Le Anh Tu 170 million VND (minus 120 million VND already paid, leaving 50 million VND); and to compensate Nguyen Ngoc Huy nearly 18.7 million VND (minus 10 million VND already paid, leaving nearly 9 million VND).

The trial ended well past noon, but T.'s mother remained motionless in her seat. When the crowd thinned out, she was helped to her feet by relatives and, with unsteady steps, left the courtroom. Phi's mother and wife, meanwhile, burst into tears, watching the prisoner transport vehicle until it disappeared from sight.

Every crime must be punished, but the pain of a mother and a wife may never truly subside…

An Quynh