The Procuracy responded to 8 main groups of issues

On April 1st, the Ho Chi Minh City People's Procuracy (Prosecution Office) responded to the defense arguments of the lawyers, the supplementary self-defense of defendant Truong My Lan and 85 other defendants; and the representatives of the victims and related parties in the case of irregularities at Van Thinh Phat Group and Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB).

The prosecution team will respond to eight groups of questions raised by lawyers and defendants during the defense and protection of their rights.

The representative of the prosecution team, representing the prosecution at the trial, expressed strong agreement with lawyer Phan Trung Hoai's viewpoint, stating that "wherever there is legal proceedings, there is also the process of exoneration." This is because, in addition to accusing, the prosecution also exonerates by seeking mitigating circumstances, presuming innocence, and acting in the best interests of the defendants.

Furthermore, the panel of prosecutors stated that they will receive all opinions from the lawyers, study and evaluate them thoroughly during the case resolution process. Based on this, the Prosecutor's Office will divide the issues into groups to respond to the lawyers and the defendant.

The group assessed the damages in the case. The lawyers argued that the prosecuting authorities should request a valuation in criminal proceedings regarding the consequences of the case. According to the Procuratorate, Articles 85 and 88 of the Criminal Procedure Code stipulate that valuation in criminal proceedings is not a mandatory requirement, and the prosecuting authorities may apply other measures. In this case, the Procuratorate did not rely on the re-evaluation by Hoang Quan Valuation Company, but rather on the statements and evidence in the case file to determine the damages as exceeding 667,000 billion VND.

Defendant Truong My Lan appeared quite tired after four weeks of trial.

However, since SCB is managing many of Truong My Lan's collateral assets to ensure the recovery of damages, and to ensure the principle of favoring the defendant, excluding a portion of the consequences for the defendants when considering the criminal liability of each defendant, the Prosecutor's Office subtracted the collateral assets from the total damages.

Regarding the lawyer's proposal, damages should be calculated using the method of subtracting the value of the collateral for each loan from the outstanding balance. The prosecution stated that this method only applies to normal credit activities, and is only used when disputes arise. However, in this case, the nature of the credit contract is the misappropriation of money from SCB, and the inclusion of collateral in each loan is merely a ploy in the criminal act. These collateral assets can then be continuously withdrawn and reinstated under the direction of Truong My Lan.

From the lawyers' perspective, the bank should waive interest for the defendants. According to the prosecution, due to the defendants' criminal acts, SCB incurred a special debt to the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) so that SCB could have the principal and interest to pay its customers. Therefore, the indictment requiring the defendants to repay the principal and interest is appropriate.

The prosecution group applied two charges against defendant Truong My Lan: "violating lending regulations in credit activities" and "embezzlement of assets." The lawyer stated that Truong My Lan's criminal acts over the past 10 years (from January 1, 2012, until her indictment in October 2022) were similar and involved the same methods, but the prosecution's decision to indict and prosecute Lan on two charges aggravated the defendant's situation.

In response, the prosecution argued that the defendant Lan's criminal act was essentially the misappropriation of money from SCB. According to Article 8 of the Criminal Code, "a crime is an act dangerous to society." Therefore, the actions of Truong My Lan and her accomplices over the past 10 years can be divided into two phases. That is, the criminal acts that occurred before January 1, 2018, should be handled under the corresponding provision, Article 179, "violations of regulations on lending in the activities of credit institutions."

Furthermore, according to the Procuratorate, from January 1, 2018, the 2015 Criminal Code (amended and supplemented in 2017) stipulated the crime of embezzlement of assets by non-state enterprises, and subsequently, there were regulations guiding that criminal acts committed from 0:00 on January 1, 2018, would be handled according to the new Criminal Code. Therefore, the actions of Lan and her accomplices, which occurred from 0:00 on January 1, 2018, constituted the crime of embezzlement of assets.

The prosecution asserted that Truong My Lan was the perpetrator of the crime of embezzlement.

Regarding the issue of Truong My Lan's denial of controlling or managing SCB to embezzle assets , the lawyer argues that Truong My Lan is not the subject of the crime of embezzlement, because the Board of Directors is the one that decides all of SCB's operations.

In response, the Prosecutor's Office stated that the new Board of Directors' decisions regarding all of SCB's operations were not in accordance with the Enterprise Law, the Law on Credit Institutions, and the documents, evidence, and results of the public examination at the trial.

The indictment from the Prosecutor's Office concludes that Truong My Lan controlled and managed all activities of SCB, based on evidence: investigative documents confirming that Truong My Lan acquired, owned, controlled, and had decision-making power over all shares, accounting for over 91.5%.

At the same time, the testimony of defendant Ta Chieu Trung indicates that Truong My Lan assigned Ta Chieu Trung to monitor the shares of SCB owned by and related to defendant Truong My Lan from the time of the merger until the initiation of the case. All changes in SCB shares had to be directed by SCB. The money Ta Chieu Trung used to purchase the shares came from Truong My Lan and Van Thinh Phat.

Thanh Nien continues to update.

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