A Vietnamese court has handed down severe sentences in connection with a series of fraud cases involving promises of employment and visa issuance in South Korea. The confirmed amount of money embezzled, using E7 and E8-2 seasonal work visas as bait, totals approximately 319 billion dong (about $18 million).
On May 29, local media reported that the People's Court of Ho Chi Minh City sentenced A, the former CEO of Nam Han International Translation Services Co., to 20 years in prison for fraud and property embezzlement, ordering full restitution to the victims.
Investigations revealed that 209 complaints had been filed against the South Korean company, with 130 individuals identified as victims. The confirmed embezzled amount was over 236 billion dong, while the total payments made, based on receipts and invoices, reached approximately 379 billion dong.
According to the indictment, A established a company in Binh Thuan in 2016 but did not have the necessary permits for overseas employment recruitment or worker dispatch. Nevertheless, A promoted an E7 visa employment program through social media, claiming to provide comprehensive support for document submission, language and skills training, and visa applications. Applicants were instructed to pay up to 22 million dong in three installments.
However, health checks, vocational training, and dispatch procedures were never carried out, and some victims received only 5 million dong (about $280) in refunds. After showing a computer screen with a visa image and demanding the remaining balance, A informed victims of their departure dates, but there were no tickets or documents at the airport, and the company had closed. A admitted to using the embezzled funds for personal purposes, despite knowing the operations were unauthorized.
Additionally, on May 27, the People's Court of Can Tho sentenced B to 16 years in prison for defrauding 222 individuals using the E8-2 seasonal work visa scheme. B, who acquired South Korean nationality and operated under the name 'Lee Yu-bin,' exploited his status as a Korean national to build trust with victims.
Among Vietnamese victims, the claim that a Korean national was directly facilitating the recruitment was a significant factor in the advertisements, contributing to the scale of the fraud. The court ordered nine intermediaries to return the money they received to the victims, and B was required to repay some directly to the victims.
From August 2023 to March 2024, B promoted the E8-2 visa, claiming it could yield over 2 million won per month, with additional earnings of about 50 million dong for overtime, without requiring proof of family relationships.
B collected a total of over 57 billion dong through nine intermediaries, charging each victim a deposit of 20 to 60 million dong. Afterward, B claimed that the boss had fled, failing to fulfill the promised procedures. The case came to light after complaints from the intermediaries. The court found insufficient evidence to prove conspiracy among the intermediaries, deeming the decision not to prosecute them appropriate.
Furthermore, the People's Court of Nghe An sentenced C to 14 years in prison for embezzling 26 billion dong under the guise of facilitating employment and seasonal work in South Korea. C downloaded images of travel packages and flight tickets from the internet, altered the information, and presented them to victims as visa exemption certificates and flight details, charging 300,000 dong per case.
C continued this fraudulent activity against multiple victims from May 2023 to October 2024. The court considered partial victim recovery, requests for leniency from victims, and the fact that C committed the crimes while pregnant, but determined that a severe penalty was unavoidable.
All three cases revealed a common scheme of advertising unauthorized guarantees of employment in South Korea, using false documents, visa images, and even the claim of being a South Korean national to build trust with victims before demanding final payments just before departure.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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