Vietnam sentences Australian drug-smuggler to death
HANOI - A court in Vietnam has sentenced an Australian man to death by firing squad and jailed two others for life for heroin trafficking, state media reported on Monday. The three, all of Vietnamese descent, were arrested in Ho Chi Minh City last year for attempting to smuggle a large amount of heroin to Australia in a tube welded into a ship container.
Delivering its verdicts last Friday, the court in the southern commercial hub also jailed two local accomplices for 16 and 20 years respectively on the same charge, the Ho Chi Minh City Laws newspaper reported. The man sentenced to death was named as Tran Van Thanh, 39. The two men jailed were Tran Van Viet, 29, and Pham Martin, 47. Anyone convicted in the communist country of smuggling 600gm of heroin runs the risk of execution or life imprisonment.
A Vietnamese-Australian woman was sentenced to death last year for attempting to smuggle 881 grams of heroin to Sydney. Her sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment. In August another Australian woman of Vietnamese origin was arrested as she tried to board an Australia-bound flight. Police said she was carrying 440gm of heroin concealed in a hair-spray bottle. She has yet to face trial.
Reuters - November 9, 2004
Vietnam sentences Australian man to death for drug trafficking
HANOI - A court in Ho Chi Minh City sentenced an Australian man to death for trafficking heroin, state-controlled media reported Monday. Tran Van Thanh, an Australian citizen of Vietnamese origin, was condemned to face a firing squad at Friday's one-day trial, the Law newspaper published by the Ho Chi Minh City Justice Department said.
Two other Australian men of Vietnamese descent, Tran Van Viet and Martin Pham, were sentenced to life in prison. Two Vietnamese defendants, Pham Dai Nhon and Le Thi Loan, received 16 and 20 years behind bars on the same charges, it said. The group was part of a drug trafficking ring that smuggled heroin from Vietnam to Australia, the newspaper said. The case was exposed in June 2003 when police arrested Nhon after he received two packets of heroin weighing nearly 700 grams (1,54 pounds) at a hotel, it said.
The Australian General Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City said two consular affair officials attended the trial. The three Australian men's ages and hometowns were not given. The convicted have 15 days to appeal their sentences. Execution dates are not announced publicly.
Vietnam has some of toughest drug laws in the world. Possessing, trafficking or trading 600 grams (1.32 pounds) of heroin or 20 kilograms (44 pounds) of opium is punishable by death or life in prison.
The Associated Press - November 08, 2004
Two Canadians reported sentenced to 16 years in Vietnam for peddling Ecstasy
HANOI - Two Canadians were sentenced up to 16 years in prison for drug-dealing in Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnamese news media reported Tuesday. Randy James Sachs, 27, was sentenced to 16 years in prison and Nguyen Van Hai Sheena, 41, to 16 years at a one-day trial Monday, the Liberated Saigon newspaper said. The two were arrested in May 2003 while distributing 1,000 Ecstasy tablets to dealers in Ho Chi Minh City night clubs, the newspaper said.
Vietnamese media said Sachs and Hai were part of a ring that trafficked the pills from overseas to Ho Chi Minh City for distribution to dealers. The defendants have 15 days to appeal their sentences.
The Associated Press - November 9, 2004
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