HÀ NỘI — A criminal involved in the trafficking of 490 heroin cakes in 2015 was sentenced to death on Tuesday morning.

Bùi Văn Biên, 30, resident of the capital city’s outer Thạch Thất District, was convicted of “illicit trafficking of narcotic drugs” and “arms trafficking” during a legal trial in the capital city on Tuesday morning.

He was sentenced to death for the first offence and given four years’ imprisonment for the latter. The final sentence for his crime was the death penalty.

Biên was arrested in May under a wanted order after fleeing his residence and being on the run for a year since 2016. His heroin trafficking ring, which transported heroin from the northern province of Sơn La to Hà Nội to be sold in China, was uncovered by the police in 2015.

Eight other members of the ring were also sentenced to death in April, including death row inmate Nguyễn Văn Tình, 28, who escaped the T16 detention centre in Hà Nội’s Thanh Oai District on September 10 and recaptured a week later.

Three others were sentenced to life imprisonment.

On July 23, 2015, 170 heroin cakes were discovered at the bottom of a gas tank when a truck transporting the tank was stopped by the Hà Nội Drug Crime Investigation Police near Cầu Đổng Bridge in the capital city’s outer Gia Lâm District.

Hundreds more heroin cakes, two K59 pistols and dozens of bullets were discovered as the investigation expanded. Some 320 heroin cakes were also found hidden at the bottom of two other gas tanks.

The total number of heroin cakes seized was 490, or 119kg. Most members of the ring were arrested.

The ring was led by Đặng Minh Châu, 44, resident of Lạng Sơn City. It was established in 2004 after Châu moved to the Guangxi autonomous region in China and lived with a local man.

Châu and her partners in crime conducted illegal trade of some 1,200 heroin cakes up till the time she was arrested. Some 862 cakes, or 304kg of heroin, were traded successfully.

Biên was involved in the trafficking of 670 of the 1,200 heroin cakes, or 231kg of heroin. — VNS