Death penalty for drug addict who burned victim's body and robbed property

According to the first instance verdict, on the morning of October 14, 2016, after monitoring several areas, Chien discovered that the house of Mr. Trieu Thai Hop, 35 years old, in Tien Duoc commune, Soc Son district, had both the gate and the door locked. Climbing the wall into the yard, Chien saw a hole in the wall where a person could crawl in, so he broke in.

Here, Chien stole a laptop and a mobile phone. Chien exchanged the stolen laptop for drugs to satisfy his addiction. He kept the phone at home.

Also with the purpose of stealing property to get money for drug use, on the evening of November 10, 2016, Chien went to the house of Ms. Ngo Thi Lam (56 years old, about 300m from the defendant's house), and discovered that this woman opened the door and carried a pile of clothes down to the restroom.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Chien sneaked into the homeowner's house and hid. A few minutes later, Mrs. Lam returned to the bedroom and discovered Chien hiding under the bed, so she shouted loudly. Afraid that someone else would discover him, Chien rushed at Mrs. Lam to restrain her.

During the struggle, the two rolled down to the kitchen. Mrs. Lam grabbed a wooden pestle and tried to hit Chien, but he grabbed it and hit her repeatedly on the head, killing her on the spot. After committing the crime, Chien ransacked the victim's house and stole 430,000 VND and 3 gold rings.

Before leaving, Chien piled up many objects around the victim's body and set it on fire to destroy the evidence. The fire was so big that it burned down Mrs. Lam's house and caused a lot of property damage. After committing the crime, Chien fled.

After nearly 4 months of tracking down this particularly dangerous criminal, on March 24, 2017, Chien was urgently arrested by the police.