A Vietnamese man who was released in 2013 after serving 10 years in jail on murder charges under a life sentence wrongfully imposed on him in 2004 will be paid US$333,100 in damages, a high-ranking judicial official has said.

>> Lifer’s sentence suspended when real culprit turns himself in The information was released by chief judge of the Supreme People’s Court Truong Hoa Binh at a meeting in Hanoi on Friday. Binh affirmed that the court had apologized to Nguyen Thanh Chan, a 54-year-old man from the northern province of Bac Giang, and said the man will be paid VND7.2 billion (US$333,100) in damages in return for his sufferings from the wrong conviction. The chief judge added that Chan had agreed to the damages although it is lower than the VND9.3 billion he had demanded. It is unacceptable for courts to wrongly sentence innocent people, Binh said, underlining that miscarriage of justice affects not only the reputation of judicial agencies but also the country’s justice system. “This issue is related to human rights, including the right to freedom and life of citizens, so we must deal with it seriously,” he stressed at the meeting, which was part of a law-making National Assembly discussion. On December 3, 2003, police in Bac Giang indicted Chan for killing a local woman and asked the provincial People’s Procuracy to prosecute him on murder charges. On March 26, 2004, the Bac Giang People’s Court opened a trial for Chan, then condemning him to life imprisonment. Chan appealed the sentence, affirming that he was innocent. He said he was forced by investigators to plead guilty to killing the woman.

However, at the appeal hearing, the Supreme People’s Court in Hanoi upheld the life sentence. During the 10 years in prison, Chan always said he was innocent and the prison management sent his petition to the Supreme People’s Court and Supreme People’s Procurary for consideration. Nguyen Thi Chien, Chan’s wife, also lodged a petition asking competent agencies to re-consider the verdict on her husband. On November 4, 2013, the Supreme People’s Procuracy issued a decision to suspend the life sentence given to Nguyen Thanh Chan and another decision to protest the verdict on him. Under these decisions, Chan was discharged from prison the same day to be reunited with his family. Two days later, the Supreme People’s Court opened a hearing for Chan’s case and canceled his life sentence. All these moves were made after the alleged culprit, Ly Nguyen Chung, 27, turned himself in to police in the Central Highlands province of Dak Lak on October 25, 2013, and pleaded guilty to killing the woman, Nguyen Thi H., to steal two rings and VND59,000 (then $2.8) in cash. On March 6, 2015, the Bac Giang Province People’s Court opened a trial for Chung, but three days later, the jury decided to suspend the hearing and returned the case file to the provincial prosecutor’s office for an additional investigation to clarify whether he had been aided by somebody else.

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