Christmas came early for a 53-year-old old Vietnamese man who
served 17 years in jail for a murder he didn't commit as the conviction
was overturned and official apology made. On Thursday, Dec. 3, authorities in Binh Thuan Province officially
apologized to Huynh Van Nen. They admitted that severe mistakes had been made, leading to the
wrong sentence. He was only cleared of the crime in
October.
Nen was arrested in May 1998 for the death of his neighbor Nguyen
Thi Bong earlier that year. Investigators said Nen admitted to killing
her to steal her belongings.
Police also said that Nen also confessed that he and nine of his
relatives had killed another woman, Duong Thi My, in 1993. All of them
were arrested soon after that.
In August 2000, a court in the central province of Binh Thuan found
him guilty of murdering Bong. He was sentenced to life in prison.
One month later, Nguyen Phuc Thanh, a relative by marriage,
appealed the verdict on Nen's behalf. Thanh claimed that two of his
friends, Nguyen Tho and Ho Van Viet, were the killers and told him about
the crime.
The appeal was rejected, as were several others in the following years.
In 2005, after several hearings, Nen and his relatives were cleared
of killing My. All of them were apologized to and compensated, except
for Nen, who went on to serve his jail sentence for the murder of Bong.
In
November 2014, the Supreme Court ordered his case to be
reopened. This time investigators concluded that he had not killed Bong.
On October 22, he was released on bail for medical treatment. On
October 28, after 17 years, his wrongful conviction in the death of Bong
was finally overturned.
Tho, one of the two suspects, was arrested last month. He confessed
to the murder. The other suspect, Viet, died in 2001. The authorities
have not mentioned how they will compensate Nen.
"I hope that other offices will cooperate with us to rapidly
restore Huynh Van Nen’s full rights, helping him return to his normal
life," judge Tran Thi Kim Huong from Binh Thuan said after delivering
the official apology.
Speaking to local media after the official apology on Thursday, Nen who was in tears said:
"I have lived in bitterness and humiliation for more than 17 years. Someone asked me if I had ever thought about suicide, to which I said no. Although I was wronged, I always believed
that someone would clear my name. I believe in justice and it finally
happened to me, even though it's late."
"I hope that investigators and judges will give careful consideration to every decision they make, so no one will ever be wrongfully convicted like I was," he added.
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