Police in Vietnam have detained four construction forepeople over allegations of paying building workers who are drug addicts with heroin.

The apprehended suspects include Nguyen Van Binh, 48, from northern Ha Nam Province, Ha Thi Huyen, 52, from Hanoi, as well as Lo Van Ban, 56, and Ha Trung Kien, 26, both from northern Lai Chau Province.

They were arrested in Tam Duong District, Lai Chau, local police said on Wednesday.

Early this month, police in Tam Duong were aware that Binh and Huyen came to Chu Va 12 Village, Son Binh Commune to undertake the Cong Troi ecotourism project and many workers obeyed them as they were given heroin as pay.

Police officers later caught Binh, Huyen, Ban, and Kien in the act of illegally trading drugs and confiscated heroin and two notebooks including information about the distribution of the drugs to workers.

Binh declared that he and Huyen hired drug addicts to work as building workers and paid them with heroin as the construction site of the project is far from residential areas, causing difficulties in seeking masons.

Binh and Huyen hired 11 drug-addicted workers and asked Ban to buy heroin. Ban later gave the heroin to Kien, who divided the drugs into smaller packs and gave them to Huyen.

Huyen assigned Kien to daily write the heroin distribution information in the notebooks.

Each heroin pack was priced at VND70,000-100,000 (US$2.9-4.1).

At the end of the month, Binh deducted the heroin costs from workers’ salaries and divided the profit from the drug trade among Ban, Kien, and Huyen.

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