Truong My Lan: Vietnamese tycoon loses death row appeal over world's biggest bank fraud

She is now in a race for her life - if she can pay back 75% of what she took, she could be spared.

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The 68-year-old is now in a race for her life because the law in Vietnam states that if she can pay back 75% of what she took, her sentence will be commuted to life imprisonment.

In April the trial court found that Truong My Lan had secretly controlled Saigon Commercial Bank, the country’s fifth biggest lender, and taken out loans and cash over more than 10 years through a web of shell companies, amounting to a total of $44bn (£34.5bn).

Of that prosecutors say $27bn was misappropriated, and $12bn was judged to have been embezzled, the most serious financial crime for which she was sentenced to death.

It was a rare and shocking verdict - she is one of very few women in Vietnam to be sentenced to death for a white collar crime.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cd753r47815o

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