The recent focus of the Truong My Lan trial has been on clarifying the details related to the act of giving and receiving bribes. The defendants, who are part of the banking inspectorate group, have sincerely admitted their guilt and declared the amount of money they received.
The path of 5.2 million USD has been clarified
Answering the questions, defendant Do Thi Nhan (former Director of the Banking Supervision and Monitoring Department II, under the State Bank of Vietnam) confessed that she received money four times from Vo Tan Hoang Van (former CEO) and Dinh Van Thanh (former Chairman of the Board of Directors of SCB – who has fled) with a total amount of 5.2 million USD.
Defendant Do Thi Nhan. Photo: Nguyen Hue |
Prior to that, defendant Vo Tan Hoang Van testified in court about the occasions when he brought a box of fruits containing money to Ms. Nhan’s house, but he was not sure of the exact amount inside. Later, when working with the investigative agency, the defendant learned that it was 5 million USD.
In court, Ms. Nhan explained that she did not receive any money or gifts from SCB during the inspection. When she completed the inspection report, which detailed SCB’s violations, and submitted it to her superiors, Mr. Van and Mr. Thanh appeared to deliver the money.
Ms. Nhan stated, “When Mr. Van handed over the money, I refused to accept it… But because Van said ‘don’t make it difficult for Van and complicate yourself.’ I was very scared, so I put the money in a corner of my house, without using it; I called Van to return the money but he refused.”
“I planned to handle the matter for my mother first and then bring the money to return to Van, but then I was arrested. I recognized my behavior and voluntarily confessed and returned the entire amount of 5.2 million USD,” Ms. Nhan said.
In reality, Ms. Nhan has returned 4.8 million USD and 10 savings books totaling over 10 billion VND to rectify the consequences.
The defendants admit the charges against them. Photo: Nguyen Hue |
Ms. Nhan specifically stated that she made some amendments in the SCB banking inspection report submitted to the government in 2018. “The bad debts of SCB fell into groups 3-5 but Mr. Hung instructed to place them in group 1,” Ms. Nhan said.
The indictment charges that because of personal motives and material benefits received from SCB, Mr. Hung instructed Ms. Nhan and the members of the group to conceal, obscure, and alter the inspection reports, so as not to report the violations in full and truthfully to the leaders of the State Bank and the Government, with the aim of not transferring the violations to the relevant authorities for legal proceedings. This allowed SCB to continue implementing its restructuring plan.
How were SCB’s wrongdoings overlooked?
In the questioning session, defendant Nguyen Van Hung admitted that the indictment was against the right person and for the right offense. The defendant received money and gifts from SCB on holidays and special occasions, with a total amount of 390,000 USD.
“The members of the inspection team have been working in the industry for many years; they have never had any flaws before and are excellent officers. I hope the court will consider reducing the penalties for the defendants,” defendant Hung cried, asking for a lenient sentence.
 Ms. Truong My Lan is accused of handing out millions of dollars in bribes to the banking inspection teams to cover up a series of SCB violations. Photo: Nguyen Hue |
The indictment stated that because of his personal motives, Mr. Hung instructed Do Thi Nhan, Nguyen Thi Phung (Deputy Head of the inspection team), and the members of the team to submit incomplete and untrue reports, concealing SCB’s violations from the leaders of the State Bank and the Government. This led to the failure to timely prevent Truong My Lan and her accomplices from illegally withdrawing and using SCB’s funds, causing particularly serious consequences of more than 514 trillion VND.
Defendant Phung admitted that the indictment was correct. She admitted that she received 20,000 USD and 210 million VND from SCB and returned it to rectify the consequences.
The scene of the Truong My Lan trial. Photo: Nguyen Hue |
The other defendants, who are part of the banking inspection group, also sincerely admitted their guilt and acknowledged the correctness of the indictment. They admitted that they were wrong to follow the instructions of their superiors.
In this case, 7 members of the inspection team were not held accountable for criminal liability but were only dealt with by the Party and the government. These 7 individuals were found to have made mistakes during the inspection process and received money from SCB. However, they only participated in part of the work assigned to them by their superiors and were only allowed to provide input within their assigned tasks; some of the inspection content was cut and altered by the members of the summary team according to the instructions of their superiors.
During the investigation process, these individuals cooperated actively with the investigative agency to quickly clarify the case. They also achieved many accomplishments in their work and were praised by the supervisory authority.
Dam De
