The Hanoi People's Court recently tried a case involving embezzlement at a PNJ store located in Aeon Mall Long Bien. All three defendants were employees of the store.
Nguyen Thi Thu, 35, who received a 22-month suspended sentence in 2023 for organizing gambling, faces charges of embezzlement. Former store manager Nguyen Huu Hong, 34, and former cashier Nguyen Thi Ngoc Nhi, 28, are accused of irresponsibility causing damage to company assets.
The indictment states Thu served as a PNJ store accountant at Aeon Mall Long Bien from 1/6 to 8/12/2024. PNJ regulations allow customers to pay by cash, card, or bank transfer to the company's official account. However, Thu exploited the trust of store employees and consultants, asking them to instruct customers to transfer payments to her personal account, or to the personal accounts of other staff members who would then transfer the funds to her.
Thu also informed sales staff that she wished to purchase jewelry, requesting them to issue invoices using customer information. After receiving the items, Thu promised to pay the company but failed to do so. She later resold this jewelry to the PNJ store on different dates or pawned it at affiliated establishments that accept PNJ gold, silver, and jewelry as collateral.
Manipulating accounting data
To conceal the embezzled funds, the accountant proceeded to legitimize these transactions.
The indictment details the cooperation agreement between PNJ and Aeon Mall Long Bien, where rent is calculated as a percentage of monthly total revenue. At the end of each day, the accountant must report revenue and transfer all cash sales to Aeon.
On the 15th and 30th of each month, both parties reconcile revenue, deduct expenses, and Aeon then transfers the remaining amount to PNJ's account.
Understanding this process, Thu manipulated data in the accounting software, making the ledgers indicate that Aeon still owed PNJ amounts corresponding to the money she had embezzled.
Authorities allege that through these methods, Thu embezzled 20 billion dong during her six months as an accountant, involving transactions under the names of 682 customers who purchased gold at the PNJ Aeon Mall Long Bien branch.
According to her testimony, Thu used all the embezzled money for online "tai xiu" gambling (a popular dice game) and lost everything.
Investigators, however, did not find other documents or evidence to corroborate the use of the embezzled money for gambling. Therefore, there are insufficient grounds to prosecute Thu for this specific activity.
Six months of fraud went undetected
The indictment further states that the other two defendants, the store manager and cashier, failed to verify actual cash collection from customers. Instead, they relied on consultants and the accountant's declarations on sales invoices. This led to sales invoices being issued without the corresponding funds being collected, resulting in a loss of nearly 9 billion dong for PNJ.
After reviewing the case file and testimonies from the defendants and related parties, the Hanoi People's Court decided to return the dossier for additional investigation. This aims to clarify the financial discrepancies involving those with relevant rights and obligations.
The court also seeks to clarify the responsibility of sales consultants and those tasked with monitoring, managing, and overseeing the business operations of the PNJ Aeon Mall Long Bien branch, given that the fraudulent activities continued for six months without detection or intervention.
By Hai Thu
