Foreigner sentenced to life for heroin trafficking

Photo: Nguoi Lao Dong

TUOI TRE

Ho Chi Minh City People’s Court Wednesday sentenced Nigerian Ben Blessed to life imprisonment for smuggling over 1 kilogram of heroin from Vietnam to China.

Three of his accomplices were also arrested and given sentences. Anyanwu Chima Stanley was sentenced to 30 years in jail for illegal possession and transportation of drugs; Ozogu John and Pham Thi Thanh Trang each received a 20-year sentence for illegally transporting drugs.

They were also fined VND20million (US$1000) to VND50million (US$2500) each.

Ben, 31, came to Vietnam in 2008 as a tourist and stayed on in HCMC illegally after his visa expired. He and John hired Trang and some Vietnamese girls to smuggle drugs from foreign countries into Vietnam and then deliver the drugs to China.

They had successfully transported the drugs to China many times until July 2009 when Trang was seized while carrying 692.9 grams of heroin to China.

The heroin was earlier smuggled by Trang, paid US$700 for the mule job, from Pakistan into Vietnam. The drugs were then put into small nylon bags and hidden in shoe soles before being smuggled to China.

Following Trang’s confession, the police arrested Ben, John and Chima and found the heroin hidden in T-shirt buttons and shoe soles at Ben’s house.

At the court hearing, the Nigerian men pleaded not guilty, claiming their earlier confessions were obtained by police coercion and misunderstanding caused by the language barrier.
Still, the judges rejected their explanations.

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Man sentenced to death for dismembering woman

Giang at the dock

Photo: An Ninh Thu Do

TUOITRENEWS

A man was Tuesday sentenced to death for murdering and dismembering a 37-year-old woman in the northern city of Hai Phong to rob her motorbike and gold ring.

The first instance trial found Nguyen Dung Giang, 31, guilty of murdering Nguyen Thi Thu Hang with a hammer in his rented house which doubles as a clothes shop on No 676 Truong Chinh Street in Hai An district.

According to indictment, at 9pm, January 5, Hang drove a motorbike to Giang’s shop. When she was not attentive, the divorced Giang smashed her head with a hammer and dragged her into a room and locked the door.

There, he cut off her head and two arms and put them into three bags which he then disposed of in three different places.

On January 7, he sold the gold ring for VND720,000 (US$36).

Denial

At court, Giang denied killing Hang. He also refused to let a lawyer defend him, claiming this lawyer accepted a bribe from judges who all wanted to sentence him to death.

Giang claimed that Hang and a strange man visited his house that fateful day, after which he borrowed Hang’s motorbike and went out for a drink.

After returning, he claimed that he found Hang already dead and the strange man gone.

Giang then told the court that he had to choice but to hide her body.

However, the court found his statements groundless.

Case file

At 1.30pm January 7, Hang’s headless body was found in an isolated area near Dam Trieu Market in Kien An District.

Her arms had been chopped off and she was naked except for a pair of underpants.

As the body offered no clues, police screened the area for missing persons. At 8pm they managed to identify her as a resident of nearby Le Chan District.

A widow, she had been living with her high-school-going son.

After finding that she had left her house at 9pm Wednesday to collect a debt, the police homed in on Giang.

Giang was arrested two days later.

Police found the victim’s red Honda Wave motorbike at a parking lot and said they have confiscated her ring without revealing details.

They found a bag containing two arms and another with clothes near the Lach Tray River.

From a deep cut on the victim’s left thigh, the police suspect it was an attempt to dismember the limb.

Curiously, Kien An District is the birthplace of 27-year-old Nguyen Duc Nghia who was sentenced to death in Hanoi last year for killing his girlfriend, beheading her, and cutting off all her fingers.

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