HCM City (VNA) – The People’s Court of Ho Chi MinhCity on March 26 decided to return dossiers of the law violation case involvingthe land lot at 57 Cao Thang street being exchanged for the land lot at 185 HaiBa Trung street in the city for further investigations as new evidence anddetails have been found.

According to the jury, it asked the Supreme People’sProcuracy to make further investigations into eight major issues, including thoserelated to the mortgage of the land lot at 57 Cao Thang of Diep Bach Duong RealEstate Co. at Agribank’s Ho Chi Minh City Branch.

The jury asked for the clarification of property leaseagreement involving the land lot at 185 Hai Ba Trung street among threeparties of Agribank, the Diep Bach Duong Real Estate Co., and Phan Thanh Company.

In this case, Duong Thi Bach Diep, Director of the Diep Bach Duong Real EstateCo., is among the key defendants in the trial, and is charged with “fraud,appropriation of assets”.

Nine other defendants in the case are charged with “lack of responsibility,causing serious consequences,” including former Vice Chairman of the municipalPeople’s Committee Nguyen Thanh Tai; former Deputy Director of the municipalDepartment of Finance Tran Nam Trang; former Director of the HCM CityLight Music Centre Vy Nhat Tao; former Director of the municipalDepartment of Culture, Sports and Tourism Nguyen Thanh Rum; former DeputyDirector of the department Le Ton Thanh; former deputy heads of the municipalPeople’s Committee Office Huynh Kim Phat and Le Van Thanh; former Directorof the municipal Department of Natural Resources and Environment Dao Anh Kiet;and former Deputy Director of the department Nguyen Thanh Nhan.

According to the indictment, the land lot at 185 Hai Ba Trung street, owned by the State,was the headquarters of the Light Music Centre under the municipal Departmentof Culture, Sports and Tourism. In 2007, the centre’s then director Vy Nhat Taocontacted Diep to cooperate in upgrading the headquarters.

Diep then proposed exchanging her land lot at 57 Cao Thang street for the 185Hai Ba Trung land lot, as she owned the land lot at 179 Hai Ba Trung street andwanted to build a five-star hotel complex there.

The property swap was approved by Nguyen Thanh Tai. During the process, Diepused the land use right certificate for the land lot at 57 Cao Thang as collateral to borrowmoney from Agribank - HCM City Branch.

After being granted a land right use certificate for the property at 185 Hai BaTrung streer, however, Diep did not use it to replace the collateral at Agribank tohand over the property at 57 Cao Thang to the Light Music Centre as committed.Instead, Diep used the 185 Hai Ba Trung land lot as collateral for aloan at Southern Bank (now Sacombank) and so far was not able to repay thedebt.

The indictment stated that Tai permitted the property swap while he was notresponsible for handling and reorganising State assets.

On March 5, 2010, Tai signed a document sent to relevant units approving theexchange of the two land lots, without any request to check and clarify thelegal status of the 57 Cao Thang land lot, causing losses of State assets.

The other defendants showed a lack of responsibility in carrying out theirduties, thus facilitating Diep’s fraud and appropriation of assets.

At the hearing on March 22, representative from the Ho ChiMinh City People’s Procuracy proposed that the court give Diep life imprisonmentfor the charge of “fraud, appropriation of assets” under Article 174 of the2015 Penal Code.

It also suggested that the court sentence Nguyen Thanh Tai,Nguyen Thanh Nhan and Vi Nhat Tao to 5-6 years in jail; Nguyen Thanh Rum, Dao AnhKiet to 4-5 years’ imprisonment; Le Van Than, Huynh Kim Phat to 3-4 years’imprisonment; and Trang Nam Trang and Le Ton Thanh to 3 years of suspendedimprisonment.

The city People’s Procuracy asked the court to return the land lot at 185 HaiBa Trung street to the HCM City Light Music Centre for management.

Earlier, the first-instance trial for the case was suspendedtwice on March 17 due to the health condition of Diep and on March 25 tore-evaluate evidence./.