On April 1, the trial of defendant Truong My Lan (68 years old, Chairwoman of Van Thinh Phat Group) and 85 other defendants continued the debate with the content of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Procuracy responding to the defense views of the lawyer, the defendant's additional self-defense, and the views on protecting rights.
In the first part of the response, the representative of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Procuracy stated that the prosecution agency always adheres to the principles of the Criminal Procedure Code, including the principle of presumption of innocence, respect for the objective truth of the case... The Procuracy respects the opinions, defense statements, and evidence of the defendants' defense lawyers.
According to the representative of the People's Procuracy, in the past days of the trial, the defendants were sincere and repentant, but some lawyers were not really serious in the debate, and their arguments did not follow the developments of the trial, affecting the rights of the defendants. Some lawyers used words that were unfounded in the assessment of the People's Procuracy.
Representative of Ho Chi Minh City People's Procuracy at the trial.
The representative of the People's Procuracy said that Truong My Lan's criminal acts had been ongoing since 2012. In essence, Truong My Lan considered SCB as a financial tool, as a place to keep money. Whenever she needed money, Truong My Lan directed the other defendants to withdraw money from SCB.
Providing collateral for loans is just a means of committing a crime. These assets can be withdrawn and replaced with other assets that do not meet legal requirements, leading to loans that are not recoverable.
According to the People's Procuracy, although Ms. Lan is not a member of the Board of Directors of SCB, the assessment of the defense attorney for defendant Truong My Lan that Ms. Lan is not the subject of the crime of Embezzlement of Property is not in accordance with the Law on Enterprises, the Law on Credit Institutions, the collected documents and the results of the examination in court.
The law clearly states that SCB is established in the form of a joint stock company operating under the law, the general meeting of shareholders is the highest body of the joint stock company, consisting of all shareholders with voting rights. The Board of Directors is only the company's management body elected by the general meeting of shareholders. Lawyers say that the Board of Directors is the highest management body at SCB, which is not in accordance with the law.
The representative of the People's Procuracy said that the basis for determining the consequences of the case does not require the establishment of a valuation council in criminal proceedings, but Article 88 can apply other measures to collect evidence to determine the consequences of the case. The embezzled amount is more than 304,000 billion VND.
Defendant Truong My Lan.
The Procuracy did not base on the valuation conclusion of Hoang Quan Company but applied other investigative measures to determine the damage of the case. The Procuracy applied the total outstanding debt minus the value of the collateral assets, which is a principle that is beneficial to the defendants.
The indictment concluded that defendant Truong My Lan had the authority to control and manage all activities of SCB, which is well-founded and in accordance with the law. The People's Procuracy believes that the documents show that Lan acquired, owned, and controlled the decisions of all the shares owned by the defendant.
Regarding the lawyer's opinion that determining the damage of a case is based on the State Bank's regulations of taking the total outstanding debt minus the value of the collateral, the People's Procuracy said that the determination only applies to criminal cases that violate regulations on normal banking activities.
However, in this case, the nature of the defendant Truong My Lan is appropriation of property, putting property into unregistered secured transactions... so the People's Procuracy does not determine the consequences of the case according to the above calculation.
In addition, the statement of shareholder changes of defendant Ta Chieu Trung (General Director of Viet Vinh Phu Company) up to June 2022 and Mr. Trung's testimony in court both show that Truong My Lan assigned Trung to monitor SCB shares owned by the defendant, related to the defendant. The changes in SCB shares were all carried out under the direction of the Chairman of Van Thinh Phat.
In addition, the interrogation record of defendant Lan confirmed that he mobilized relatives and friends to buy shares before the merger of 3 banks to reach 65%, then continued to increase the shares.
Although the defendant Truong My Lan did not manage SCB assets, she had absolute control and therefore the right to elect and dismiss SCB members. From there, this defendant arranged key members to assist her.
" These are the conditions, methods and tricks that the defendant took advantage of to appropriate money at SCB," said the representative of the People's Procuracy.
Other defendants at trial.
Regarding the view that SCB bank's sale of debt to VAMC was permitted by the State Bank, the outstanding debt sold to VAMC is still attributed to the consequences of the case.
According to the representative of the People's Procuracy, although the law allows credit institutions to apply measures of debt sale, debt offset... to handle bad debts, in this case the defendants used debt sale and debt offset as tricks and methods to hide bad debts, conceal criminal acts to appropriate money withdrawn from SCB, so the defendants must still be responsible for these debts.
According to the representative of the People's Procuracy, although Truong My Lan's behavior was continuous over a long period of time with the same methods and tricks, the People's Procuracy prosecuted her for two different crimes because during the period from 2012 to 2018, the criminal acts of Truong My Lan and her accomplices satisfied the crime of violating regulations on lending in the activities of credit institutions of the 1999 Penal Code.
From 2018 onwards, the 2015 Penal Code (amended and supplemented in 2017) took effect, and based on the documents guiding its implementation, during this period, Truong My Lan's actions had sufficient elements to constitute the crime of embezzlement of property. Therefore, the prosecution of the two crimes by the People's Procuracy was well-founded.
Regarding the accusation that Truong My Lan was the mastermind and leader, the prosecution maintained the opinion that the defendant considered SCB as a financial tool, a place to keep money, and whenever money was needed, he would give instructions as stated in the indictment.
With the available documents and grounds, although there are no results of judicial assistance in verifying and clarifying the 5 foreign enterprises that hold shares for Ms. Lan, there is enough basis to determine that Ms. Truong My Lan is the subject of the crime of Embezzlement of property.
The fact that the lawyers requested the prosecution agency to prove that 5 foreign joint stock companies bought the defendant's shares does not change the fact that Ms. Lan holds control over these shares.
According to the People's Procuracy, some lawyers believe that it is necessary to request property valuation in criminal proceedings. According to the People's Procuracy, in this case, the prosecuting agency did not apply valuation measures but applied other evidence collection measures to value the property.
The investigation results determined that the damage caused by Ms. Truong My Lan's actions was more than 677,000 billion VND, consistent with the accounting system on the SCB software system, the statements of other defendants, the independent auditor...
The People's Procuracy believes that the prosecution agency considered the damage that Ms. Truong My Lan had appropriated and suffered to be 677,000 billion VND.
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