Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang and her accomplices prepare to appear in court.

On May 4, the Ho Chi Minh City People's Court received the case file of Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang (52 years old, General Director of Dai Nam Joint Stock Company) and 4 accomplices and assigned a judge from the Criminal Court of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Court to handle the case.

The judge assigned to handle this case is Mr. Bui Duc Nam (Criminal Court of Ho Chi Minh City People's Court). In addition, Ho Chi Minh City People's Court is planning to try the case.

Bà Nguyễn Phương Hằng và đồng phạm chuẩn bị hầu tòa - 1 — Ho Chi Minh City People's Court is preparing to try Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang and her accomplices (Photo: Provided by the Police).

According to the case file, Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang and her accomplices took advantage of and used 12 social media channels to livestream, violating the privacy and affecting the reputation and honor of many individuals such as Mr. Vo Nguyen Hoai Linh (artist Hoai Linh), Ms. Nguyen Thi My Oanh (singer Vy Oanh), Ms. Dang Thi Han Ni (journalist, master of law Han Ni), Mr. Huynh Minh Hung (singer Dam Vinh Hung), Ms. Tran Thi Thuy Tien (singer Thuy Tien) and her husband Le Cong Vinh, Mr. Nguyen Duc Hien (Deputy editor-in-chief of Ho Chi Minh City Law Newspaper)...

During the investigation, Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang stated that the information she said during livestream and posted on Facebook about the above individuals was all what she read on the internet, in newspapers and in her dreams, and had not been verified and had no basis for proof.

The case file shows that, to increase the prestige and credibility of her statements, Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang invited Mr. Dang Anh Quan (Doctor of Law, lecturer at Ho Chi Minh City University of Law) to join her livestreams. When Ms. Hang made offensive statements to others, Mr. Quan interacted and spoke about related content, contributing to encouraging the spirit and giving more will to the owner of Dai Nam to commit the crime.

Explaining his participation in livestreams with Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang, Mr. Dang Anh Quan said he wanted to comfort and understand Ms. Phuong Hang.

The indictment determined that the defendants Nguyen Phuong Hang and 4 accomplices were given mitigating circumstances because the criminals confessed honestly and repented.

In addition, Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang was awarded many certificates of merit and awards for her volunteer activities by a number of state agencies and social organizations, which is a mitigating circumstance for her criminal responsibility, as stipulated in Clause 2, Article 51 of the 2015 Penal Code, amended and supplemented in 2017.

However, Ms. Hang and her four accomplices have two aggravating circumstances for criminal liability: committing the crime in an organized manner and committing the crime two or more times.

Since then, the Ho Chi Minh City People's Procuracy has prosecuted Ms. Nguyen Phuong Hang and 4 accomplices before the Ho Chi Minh City People's Court for trial on the charge of "Abusing democratic freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the State, the legitimate rights and interests of organizations and individuals" under Clause 2, Article 331 of the 2015 Penal Code, amended and supplemented in 2017.

Accordingly, Clause 2, Article 331 of the current Penal Code has a penalty range from 2 years to 7 years in prison.

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