Six sentenced to death for murder of young woman

The Dien Bien People’s Court awarded Vi Van Toan, mastermind of the crime, the death sentence for murder and 13 years for kidnapping. Bui Van Cong got death, 14 years for rape and 13 years for kidnapping.

The other four that received the death penalty were Vuong Van Hung, Luong Van Hung, Luong Van La and Pham Van Nhiem.

Pham Van Dung and Cam Van Chuong were sentenced to 10 and nine years in jail, respectively, for rape. Cong’s wife Bui Thi Kim Thu got three years for not reporting crime to the police.

The indictment said that Toan had told the other seven men that Duyen’s mother, Tran Thi Hien, owed him a lot of money, so he wanted them to help him kidnap her daughter and blackmail her. In return, Toan would give them money and drugs.

Hung then came to check out chickens sold by Hien and her daughter Duyen, a college student, at the Muong Thanh Market in Dien Bien Phu Town on February 4. He asked for Duyen’s number so that he could place orders later. The same night, he called Duyen and asked her to deliver 13 chickens to a specific address in town.

After Duyen arrived with the chickens, driving a motorbike on her own, he and others in the group kidnapped her and strangled her till she fainted. They also took the chickens and the bike. Then they took her to Cong’s house and from the night of February 4 to the first hours of February 7, the group raped her one after another and killed her on the morning of February 7.

They dumped her body in an abandoned house five kilometers (three miles) away.

On November 28, Tran Thi Hien was sentenced to 20 years for her connection to the drug ring that led to her daughter being kidnapped, raped and murdered in February. The court found the 44-year-old guilty of storing, transporting and illegally purchasing narcotics.