Despite being under investigation, he still risked defrauding people of 1 billion VND to "get a suspended sentence."
After being arrested for fraud involving the misappropriation of property through bribery to influence court cases, Luu Xuan Tam was released on bail. At this time, Tam continued to fabricate stories about his connections at the Supreme People's Procuratorate to gain the trust of a defendant, who then handed over 1 billion VND to him to secure a suspended sentence.
On September 17th, the People's Court of Nghe An province opened a trial to hear the case against two defendants, Tran Hai (born in 1970, residing in Da Nang city) and Luu Xuan Tam (born in 1979, originally from Nghe An province, residing in Dong Nai province), for the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property.
According to the case file, around December 2022, Mr. Luong Van Q. (residing in Vinh Phu ward) was detained for gambling offenses and thus became acquainted with Luu Xuan Tam. At that time, Tam was being held by the police for "Fraudulent appropriation of property" through the act of influencing court proceedings.
In mid-March 2023, due to a change in the preventive measure (release on bail), the two met again. During their meeting and conversation, Tam introduced himself to Q. as someone working at the investigative agency of the Supreme People's Procuracy who had helped him, and that he was seeking this person's help to secure a suspended sentence.
Trusting that Tam had extensive connections, Q. contacted him to help secure a suspended sentence. After Q. sent images of the indictment, Tam forwarded them to Hai to see if he could help obtain a suspended sentence. A few days later, Hai told Tam that he had secured a suspended sentence for 700 million VND.
Although Tam had previously been arrested for fraud involving the misappropriation of property through a scheme to influence court decisions, and therefore knew that Tran Hai did not work at the Supreme People's Procuratorate, Tam used that information to deceive Q. into believing he could help him get away with the case.
Believing Tâm's words were true, Mr. Q. transferred money to Tâm several times. Between May 17th and 19th, 2023, Mr. Q. transferred 700 million VND to Tâm to "fix the case".
After receiving the agreed-upon amount, and wanting to extort more money from the victim, Hai told Tam that because the case involved many people, in order to secure a suspended sentence for Q., they needed to pay more to bribe the accomplices. Therefore, Tran Hai instructed Tam to take nearly 300 million VND more from Q.
The investigating agency determined that from May 14, 2023 to June 11, 2023, Luu Xuan Tam embezzled 1 billion VND from Mr. Q. Of that amount, Tran Hai directed and colluded with Tam to embezzle 930 million VND from Mr. Q. to influence the case, while Tam pocketed the remaining 70 million VND for himself.
Subsequently, Mr. Q. was sentenced to 4 years in prison for "gambling". Nearly a year later, the victim filed a complaint accusing Hai and Tam of fraud.
At the trial, the two defendants admitted their crimes. Defendant Tam confessed that, driven by greed and the need to pay off debts, he defrauded Mr. Q. even though he was already under investigation for "Fraudulent appropriation of property" through a scheme to influence court proceedings.
Defendant Hai confessed that he committed the fraud to steal money from the victim. Both defendants requested the court to consider mitigating circumstances and reduce their sentences.
The court ruled that the defendants' actions were dangerous to society, directly infringing upon the property rights of others protected by law, and causing disruption to social order and security.
After considering the role of each defendant in the case, the panel of judges sentenced Luu Xuan Tam to 14 years in prison and Tran Hai to 12 years in prison for the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property".