Having lost at gambling, a South Korean man stole $100,000 from his friend.
Having borrowed $50,000 to gamble but lost it all, Lee Hyun Soo broke into his best friend's apartment, stole $100,000 to pay off his debts, and continued gambling.
On July 22, Lee Hyun Soo (32 years old), a South Korean national, was sentenced to 14 years in prison by the Ho Chi Minh City People's Court for the crime of...Theft of property";They are required to compensate the victim for the entire amount of money they stole.
In court today, Soo admitted to all the crimes.
Soo and Kim (39 years old) have been close friends since their time in Korea. Many years ago, they came to Vietnam together to do business, living in two apartments in the Masteri Thao Dien condominium complex in Thu Duc City.
Trusting Soo, at the end of 2023, Kim and his girlfriend returned to South Korea, so he entrusted Soo with the apartment's password and the safe's password to check the money. After that, when Kim returned to Ho Chi Minh City to live, he kept the same password.
On June 13, 2024, Soo went to a casino in a hotel in Ho Chi Minh City to play "Slot Machines" - a service exclusively for foreigners. Having lost all his money, he borrowed $50,000 from a fellow countrywoman (whose identity is unknown) to try and recoup his losses, but ended up losing it all. Unable to repay the debt, Soo conceived the idea of stealing from Mr. Kim.
The next morning, knowing his best friend was on a business trip to Hanoi, Soo went to his friend's house, opened the safe, and took 10 stacks of 100 USD bills (100,000 USD, equivalent to 2.5 billion VND) back to his apartment. Afterward, he took the money to the hotel to pay off his debt to the woman and continued gambling.
Soo lost another $23,000, leaving him with $27,000 for travel expenses with his girlfriend. On June 15th, Kim discovered the money was missing and reported it to the police.
