Oceanbank fraud trial: Dinh La Thang appeals against court’s decision

Dinh La Thang (second from left) has submitted his written appeal asking the Hanoi People’s Court for reconsidering his charge, penalty and civil responsibility

Earlier, the court on March 29 handed down an 18-year jail sentence to Thang for his principal role in the OceanBank case that caused losses of VND800 billion (US$35.2 million) to the State budget.

The Hanoi People’s Court has also received written appeals of other five defendants in the case after two weeks it issued the verdicts for the first-instance judgment. They included Nguyen Xuan Son, former Deputy General Director of PetroVietnam, sentenced to 30 months in prison; Vu Khanh Truong, former member of the Member Council of PetroVietnam, sentenced to 5 years in jail; Nguyen Thanh Liem and Phan Dinh Duc, who are also former members of the PetroVietnam Member Council, receiving non-custodial re-education periods of 20 months and 15 months, respectively; and Ninh Van Quynh, former chief accountant and former head of the department of finance, accounting and auditing of PetroVietnam, 23 years behind bars.

The jury asked the defendants to compensate VND800 billion for the losses they caused to PetroVietnam. Of the total, Dinh La Thang has to refund VND600 billion (US$26.4 million); Ninh Van Quynh, VND100 billion (US$4.4 million); and Vu Khanh Truong, VND40 billion (US$1.76 million). Each of the four other defendants has to give back VND15 billion (US$660,000) to the State.

Ninh Van Quynh, who was found abusing his position and power to misappropriate VND20 billion (US$880,000) from OceanBank, had previously refunded the amount.

In 2008, after failing to establish Hong Viet Commercial Joint Stock Bank, PetroVietnam decided to invest in OceanBank.

From 2008 to 2011, Dinh La Thang instructed and decided on PetroVietnam’s investment in OceanBank to become a shareholder of the bank.

Under his instruction, Vu Khanh Truong, Nguyen Thanh Liem, Nguyen Xuan Thang, Phan Dinh Duc, Nguyen Xuan Son and Ninh Van Quynh carried out three contributions of the group’s capital totaling VND800 billion to OceanBank.

Due to OceanBank’s poor capability and violations committed by Ha Van Tham, former Chairman of OceanBank’s Board of Directors, the bank suffered serious losses, leading to the loss of the whole VND800 billion invested by PetroVietnam when the State Bank of Vietnam was forced to buy OceanBank at zero VND.