The crime of the thief who burned the body of a single woman

Last week, the Hanoi People's Court opened the first instance trial of Ta Van Chien (38 years old, in Soc Son district) for the crimes of Murder, Robbery, Theft and Property Destruction.

During nearly an hour of interrogation, Chien confessed that he was a drug addict and unemployed. He often stalked unsuspecting families to steal and get money to buy heroin.

In mid-October 2016, Chien climbed over the wall, crawled through the ventilation window of a level four house in Tien Duoc commune (Soc Son district) and stole a laptop and a mobile phone. With the money from selling the laptop, the defendant bought drugs.

Nearly a month later, he spies on Mrs. Ngo Thi Lam’s house, about 300 meters from where Chien lives, and sees the woman who lives alone open the door and take her clothes to the bathroom. The defendant quickly sneaks into the house and hides under the homeowner’s bed.

Later, Mrs. Lam saw Chien under the bed and was startled, screaming. A struggle broke out between the two sides, until they went to the kitchen. The homeowner grabbed a wooden pestle to fight back, but the thief snatched it back and hit her on the head many times, leading to her death on the spot.

Chien rummaged through the house and took three gold rings and 430,000 VND from the victim. Before leaving, he gathered clothes and belongings from the surrounding area, piled them on top of the body, and set fire to it. The fire also caused extensive property damage to the house.

The "compassion" of the person who disposed of the woman's body

His face wrinkled, his eyes closed each time he answered the jury’s questions, Chien said he had no intention of killing Ms. Lam. “The defendant only intended to steal,” Chien mumbled.

The defendant said that when Mrs. Lam found out, he asked the homeowner for forgiveness but was not accepted. He gave the reason for the crime that he ran away but the homeowner caught him. “The defendant is very remorseful,” Chien said.

But the judge said harshly: “If the defendant repents, when he committed the crime, he should have called for help to the victim, showing his humanity.” After committing the crime, the defendant also took a mat and clothes and piled them on Mrs. Lam and set them on fire. That act was savage and thuggish.

“At that time, the defendant could not think of anything,” Chien explained in a small voice. According to Chien’s further confession, he sold and bought drugs to use the property he took from Ms. Lam.

Documents show that Chien’s burning of the victim’s body caused many difficulties for the investigation agency. While the police force searched for the perpetrator, Chien was at large, and the victim’s two daughters were always in pain because the perpetrator was still at large.

During that time, Chien voluntarily went to drug rehabilitation. “The defendant always had a guilty conscience after committing the crime against Ms. Lam,” Chien explained. He said that because of his remorse, he reported his actions to the police.

Before the defendant's testimony, the victim's daughter choked up: "Chien had carefully calculated how my mother would die without anyone noticing, the defendant would be innocent." She said that Chien had followed her family many times. After her father passed away, only Mrs. Lam lived in the house, because her two daughters had gotten married. Chien knew this, so he often lurked around and stole when he saw her mother being careless. "The defendant once went to my mother's house to steal a bag of rice," she said.

She also said that Chien's actions were not accidental or confused, so she asked the court to sentence him to the highest sentence - the death penalty. In addition, as a representative of the victim, she asked the court to force the defendant to pay compensation. "My father passed away, my mother was building a house, so when she passed away, we had to pay many debts," she explained.

At the end of the first instance trial, the jury sentenced Chien to death after determining that the defendant was no longer capable of reform.