HÀ NỘI — Hà Nội People’s Court on Monday handed sentences to five Republic of Korea (RoK) and Vietnamese who conned Vietnamese labourers into working in RoK.

Kim Young Hwan, 55, a RoK national, was sentenced to life imprisonment for swindling to appropriate properties.

Vietnamese nationals Hoàng Thị Cúc, Hwan’s wife, and Giang Vĩnh Thắng were sentenced to 16 years and 20 years in prison, respectively, for committing similar offences.

Nguyễn Ngọc Đại received 11 years in prison for abusing trust to appropriate assets and counterfeiting organisations’ stamps and documents.

Another defendant, Nguyễn Thị Nhung, was sentenced to three years in prison for abusing trust to appropriate assets.

According to the indictment, Hwan and his wife established Hoàng Kim Development, Trading and Investment Joint Stock Company in 2014.

The company is not authorised to send people to work or study overseas, but the defendants sent labourers to work in RoK under the guise of internship in Korean schools.

Hwan and his wife promised that after the internship, each labourer would be offered a job of US$1,200-1,700 per month. If the Korean language skills of overseas students pass the beginning or higher level in the first three to six months, the school refunds 30-50 per cent of the tuition fee.

The accused gained the trust of the labourers by offering them fake recruitment in some schools.

In the process, Hwan and his accomplices swindled VNĐ10.3 billion ($450,000) in total.

They refunded VNĐ1.4 billion ($60,900) to the victims. Hwan himself was accused of swindling another VNĐ6.9 billion ($300,000).

He had 13 criminal records in RoK.

At the court hearing, the couple confessed that they had sent most of the swindled money to two other people in RoK, adding they were unable to compensate. — VNS