VIETNAM SENTENCES OFFICIAL TO DEATH FOR STEALING DRUGS

a court in north-western Vietnam sentenced a law enforcement official and his cousin to death for stealing 10.7 kgs of drugs from a police warehouse where they were held as evidence in drug-trafficking cases. The People's Court of Lai Chau province delivered the sentences to Vu Trong Viet, 33, and his cousin Nguyen Hong Quan, 27, said Nguyen Quang Tan, director of the province's Justice Department. "Viet was a civil law enforcement official of the provincial Justice Department when he was arrested," Tan said. "It is the first time that a justice official has been sentenced to death for stealing evidence from a criminal case." According to police, the two defendants broke into the department's warehouse in October and stole 8.1 kgs of opium and 2.6 kgs of heroin that had been used as evidence in 39 drug-trafficking cases in the province. "They confessed to the police that they didn't plan to use all of the drugs themselves but would sell most of them to make money," Tan said.