Large-scale illegal drug production rings crack down in HCM City
Ho Chi Minh City police recently busted two illegal drug rings, arresting 15 suspects and seizing 520,000 MDMA pills and 120 kg of powder drug equal to one million crystal methamphetamine pills worth more than US$8.8 million.
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The rings were tracked from 2016, under the direction of Major General Pham Anh Minh, Vice Director of the municipal Public Security Department.
Initial investigations indicated that the drugs were provided by Tran Ngoc Hieu, born in 1981 in Hanoi, and Vu Tuan Phan, born in 1979 in Hai Phong. Hieu’s ring specialised in producing MDMA, while Phan’s group processes crystal meth.
Hieu’s facility is equipped with modern and automatic machines. After finishing a batch, he moves the facility to a new location, according to the police.
Earlier on December 17, 2016, police arrested Nguyen Van Son, a distributor of Hieu and Phan, while he was delivering 100 tablets of crystal meth in Binh Thanh district. The next day, they raided Phan’s drug production facility in Tan Phong ward, District 7, seizing two suspects, 20,000 MDMA pills, 3.7kg of powder drug, 35kg of meth and 670 million VND in cash.
On April 6, the police raided a villa in Phu My Hung residential area in District 7, discovering a drug warehouse. The same day, Hieu was arrested after landing in Tan Son Nhat airport in Ho Chi Minh City.
According to the police, Hieu’s facility is the largest of its kind in Vietnam. Since early 2016, the facility produced more than 300kg of drugs.
Police said the production was directed and supervised by Hieu’s cousin, Nguyen Duc Ky Nam, an engineer born in 1968 in Hanoi and residing in Phu Nhuan district.
Further investigation is underway.
