Vietnam online gambling ring defendants sentenced
News on 4 Sep 2015
News on 4 Sep 2015
Operating an online gambling ring in Vietnam can have serious personal consequences, as 56 defendants discovered in a Ho Chi Minh City court this week when sentences ranging from nine months to 8 years imprisonment were handed down.
The defendants had earlier been found guilty of online gambling offences allegedly associated with the 1888bet.com gambling website.
Eight other individuals, believed to be online punters, were fined between US$1,300 and US$2,200.
The longest jail sentence was imposed on the alleged ring-leader of the illegal enterprise, Vuong Chan Thanh, who now faces eight years in a Vietnamese jail.
Prosecutors claimed that between October 2011 and October 2013, Thanh, a director of Vien Tin International Telecommunication Ltd Co, asked his relatives and employees to open 55 bank accounts to receive and transfer earnings from illegal gambling operations via 188bet.com. It is claimed that over US$30 million was illegally transferred.
