Hai Phong police chief gets 10 years for taking $1M bribes by fraud

The Quang Ninh People’s Court said that Ca had appropriated an especially high amount of money and directly violated people’s right to property.

Ca, 66, was charged with fraudulent appropriation of property for taking a bribe of VND35 billion from Truong Xuan Duoc, 52, a businessman who sold tax invoices after falsely promising to help him avoid imprisonment.

Duoc was sentenced to 24 months in jail for issuing and dealing in illegal invoices and receipts for payment of state revenues, as well as seven years in jail for giving bribes, totaling nine years.

Duoc’s wife, Nguyen Ngoc Anh, was sentenced to 18 months in jail for issuing and dealing in illegal invoices and receipts for payment of state revenues, along with three years in jail for giving bribes, totaling to four years and six months.

Nguyen Dinh Duong, former head of the Cat Hai District Tax Office in Hai Phong that borders Quang Ninh, was sentenced to six years and six months in jail for receiving bribes. His subordinate, Do Thanh Hoai, was sentenced to four years and six months in jail for the same charge.

Duoc began dealing with illegal invoices and receipts for profit starting in 2005 when he formed the Khanh Dung company. In 2018 Duoc and his wife began to form multiple companies to evade detection. By the time of their arrest in February 2023, they had already formed 26 such companies. Their crimes has been committed over a long period of time without being dealt with.

Authorities said Duoc and his wife had illegally gained VND41 billion with illegal invoices and receipts.

To assist with their actions, Duoc and his wife had cooperated with Duong and Hoai. They gave Duong and Hoai a total of VND362 million in illegal earnings from August 2021 to August 2022.

Duoc and Ca meanwhile had a close relationship spanning 19 years. When Duoc’s actions veered into the scope of Quang Ninh police, Duoc told his wife to seek Ca for help, before he fled the city.

When Ca said he would need money to resolve the consequences of Duoc’s actions, Duoc and his wife brought to Ca a total of VND35 billion, thinking the money would help them get away with what they did. However, Duoc was arrested on February 3 last year, while his wife was arrested four days later. Ca was arrested on March 15 last year.

Ca said Duoc and his wife should repay the money they stole from the state, and that he told Ngoc Anh not to receive the bribe money and to not bring it to his home. Ca claimed that he never touched the bags of money, and only knew they contained VND35 billion when the police checked them.

Duoc meanwhile said Ca was not willing to admit what he did, adding that if Ca did not ask for it, his family would not have withdrawn money from the bank.

After a night of thinking, on the second day of the three-day trial, Ca said he admitted to the charges of obtaining property by fraud.