In the 2018 film Ocean's 8, eight glamorous, quick-witted and wilyClever and crafty. women, led by the newly paroled con artist Debbie Ocean, devise an elaborate plan to steal a $150 million Cartier necklace at the Met Gala, the world's most prestigiousHighly respected. fashion event.

With their impossibly fashionable get-ups and impressively high heels, the women take advantage of the ways in which they are underestimated. They work right underneath the nose of the authorities, never suspected: after all, they joke, heistsA robbery, especially one in which money, jewellery, or art is stolen. are usually conducted by men.

Perhaps the Vietnamese property developer Truong My Lan felt like the fictional Debbie Ocean, as she spent an impressive 11 years looting one of the country's largest banks, before anybody noticed a thing.

The scale of her crime is dizzying, amounting to $44 billion (£35 billion). It is the biggest financial fraud case in Vietnam's history, with the spoils amounting to a staggering 3% of the country's entire GDP. And as if that were not audaciousBold. enough, My Lan is also convicted of bribing government officials to get her way.

But the ambitious business woman flew too close to the sun. Amid a contentiousControversial, likely to cause an argument. anti-corruption campaign in Vietnam, she has been sentenced to death for her crimes. This is one of very few instances of the death sentence being invoked for a white collarRelating to work done in an office or another professional space. crime.

The court case was a colourful public spectacle: 2,700 people were summoned to testify in the trial, which involved over 200 lawyers. The evidence was presented in 104 boxes weighing a total of six tonnes.¹

Despite her lofty aspirations, Truong My Lan comes from humble beginnings, selling cosmetics at a market stall with her mother. It was only when the Communist Party started reforming the economy in the 1980s that she saw an opportunity to acquire land and property.

She soon became a symbol of the country's deep-rooted corruption. Access to land in Vietnam relies on personal relationships with state officials. Nothing can be done without having the ear of somebody in power.

And so some see it as unfair that Truong My Lan is facing such a harsh sentence. Many believe her misdeedsWicked or illegal acts. were protected by powerful figures in Ho Chi Minh City for years, and that she is only a symbol of a much wider issue.

After the 2008 financial crisis, the greatest economic disaster since the Great Depression, many called for the US Wall Street bankers and executives who they felt had brought about the crisis through excessive risk-taking and predatorySomething that preys on others. loans to be given jail time. All but one walked free.²

This crisis led to a loss of over $2 trillion in global economic growth and wiped out $8 trillion in stock market value. Americans alone saw a $9.8 trillion loss in wealth. Yet those involved did not even receive a slap on the wrist: in fact, many were bailed out using taxpayer funds.

Next to the crisis in 2008, Truong My Lan's enormous heist seems small, and so sentencing her to death appears absurd. But many think the sentence is intended as symbolic: an attempt to finally put the country's endemicCommon to a particular place or community. corruption problem to sleep.

Is this penalty too harsh?

Yes: Money can never measure up to a person's life. It is inconceivable to even imagine feeling entitled to take somebody's life over a few billion pounds.

No: My Lan's fraud and embezzlement accounted for 3% of Vietnam's entire GDP. This is a crime of epic proportions which cannot be treated with the usual rules.

Or... There is no crime where the death penalty can ever be justified, however egregiousNoticeably bad. , violent or disgusting. No government or court should be able to decide if somebody lives or dies.