Pham Cong Luan and Nguyen Thi Chung lived with each other as if they were married in order to operate a human trafficking ring in Ninh Thuan Province.

Victims of “marriage mirage”

On August 10, People’s Court in the central province of Ninh Thuan sentenced Chung, 52, to eight years, and Luan, 65, to six years in prison for human trafficking.

According to the Tay Ninh Provincial People’s Procurancy’s indictment, even though Luan has yet to divorce real wife, he lived with Chung.

Chung’s daughter, Nguyen Thi Hong Nhung, got married with a Malaysian man. In 2006, Nhung returned to Vietnam to make plans with her mother for selecting Vietnamese women to sell in Malaysia.

Chung and Nhung reached an agreement under which Nhung sent her mother USD500 in advance. Chung would then earn USD200 for each woman she sent to Malaysia.

Chung soon began cooperating with Luan to find girls in Tay Ninh who wished to marry Malaysian men.

Luan made several trips to HCM City to make false birth certificates and other documents for seven of the victims, who were under the age of 18.

Between 2006 and 2010, Chung and Luan succeeded in sending five women to Nhung in Malaysia.

According to the offenders’ statement, there were seven other women they sent, whose exact whereabouts they do not know.

Last October, Chung and Luan were caught while processing exit documents for three women.

Luan had previously been sentenced to 16 years in prison for efforts to overthrow the local government and sabotaging public assets.