A BOOK ON U.S. APPLICABLE LAW

Deacon San Nguyen

GOOD INTENTION, BAD JUDGEMENT

Thu and her husband, Don, had 4 children. The youngest one was 8 years old, the eldest one was 16 years old.

Thu and Don arrived in America under ODP program 11 years ago. Thu was a talented cook since she lived in Vietnam. After being resettled in this country, Thu immediately worked for some Vietnamese restaurants. Due to her talent, Thu got very high pays. Many restaurants solicited her to work for them but she just chose to work at a restaurant in which the boss respected her the most. Don was once a good tailor in Vietnam. Arriving in America, to make ends meet, Don did clothes alterations at his friend’s shop. With his talent, gradually, many people came to him for their dress and pants alterations. Seeing that people liked his styles, Don opened a small shop at home for clothes alterations only. Time passed by. Both Thu and Don were able to save a large sum of money. They decided to open a big restaurant seating 300 customers at a time. Thu worked as the chief cook. She had three Hispanic employees to assist her in cooking. Don worked as the receptionist. With their good customer service and tasty food, their restaurant became a famous one. Customers had to get in line waiting for service. Consequently, few years later, several businessmen came and offered to buy the restaurant. Indeed, both Thu and Don already felt tired with their restaurant job. Usually, they had to work from 12 to 15 hours a day, 7 days a week. No break time. Less caring for their children. In fact, their two older children had to help them on Saturdays and Sundays, too. Watching her children working at the restaurant, Thu felt very sad. She just wanted to get rid of her restaurant. However, all possible customers requested the same thing: after the restaurant changed the owner, Thu continued to be the chief cook for them. That condition made Thu confused very much. She just wanted to get away from the restaurant to care more for her children, especially when they were growing up fast and needed the care of their parents.

After many days thinking hard, Thu and Don decided to sell their restaurant with less price without the above condition. They did not want to stay with the restaurant anymore. Dream came true. One day, a frequent customer took a strange man to their restaurant and offered them
$120,000.00 in “cash” for the goodwill and did not request Thu to stay work for him. Happily, Thu and Don accepted the offer without thinking about the “cash” offer instead of a bank check. They hurried to clear their “things” for two weeks and then made appointment with the buyer to finish the business transaction. When the time came, Thu and Don gladly received $120,000.00 cash after signing personal paperwork with Henry, the new owner. They handed the keys to Henry with smiles and began to imagine about a vacation with the whole family.

Then, an unexpected thing happened. Right at the moment Thu put the cash into her bag, there was a knock at the door. Thu opened it. Two gentlemen with black suits walked in the restaurant and showed them their FBI cards. Without explanation, the FBI guys handcuffed Thu and Don. Then they walked very fast to the back room and handcuffed Henry and his friend, at that time, was busy looking at the huge freezer. All four people were shoved in a van and drove directly to County Jail. When they got there, Thu was separated and detained in female cell. Thu and Don were temporary detained in that jail for 2 nights and 3 days before they could be bailed out.

About the 4 children, they were visited by 2 policemen at the same time the FBI guys arrested their parents. The policeman asked the oldest child, 16 years old, to see if they had a relative in town; if they did not, they would be sent to a secret place built for abandoned children. Lucky for them, they had an aunt living in the same province, thus, the police took them there to live with their aunt.

When Thu and Don were bailed out, a lawyer came to them and explained to their understanding that Henry, the new owner, and Wang, the frequent customer of Thu’s restaurant, were the leaders of a ring of drug dealers. FBI had followed them closely since a long time ago. The cash that Henry gave to Thu was FBI’s money; that had secret numbers on each of them. Because Thu had taken a large cash from Henry, both Thu and Don were considered as accomplices, in fact, they were doing Money Laundering for Henry and Wang.

The lawyer also told Thu and Don that they might be accused by both State and Federal at the same time, Dual Sovereignty, because of the law of Money Laundering. (This case could not be considered as Double Jeopardy). As per Federal Criminal Law, article 18, number 1956, Money Laundering was a felony. The criminals would be charged at the maximum either $500.000 or maximum of
20 years in jail. Sometimes defendants received both penalties from State and Federal, too.

At Court, the lawyer for Thu and Don tried many reasons to pursue a light sentence for the couple.

The lawyer convinced the Judge and the Jury with several reasons as followed:

• Thu and Don were honest citizens and never committed any crimes before (lack of crime history).
• They always filed their income tax on time every year. Unlike other businessmen usually claimed loss after first year in business, the couple claimed gains right at the first year in business.
• On the transaction paper, Thu and Don honestly put the amount of money in cash clearly. This proved that Thu and Don did not deny their responsibility when they took cash payment. Indeed, they intended to file a report to FBI after the transaction was completed.
• On the written reports of both suspects Henry and Wang, they already reported that they did not have any relationship besides eating Vietnamese food at Thu’s restaurant. They never knew each other before the transaction day.

In spite of that, after 30 minutes discussing behind the Court, a Judge gave them a heavy sentence: Thu and Don had to be in jail for 4 years. Their children who were still teenagers had to be living with their aunt until they turned to 18. However, they only had to serve half of their sentence because they followed prison rules and maintained good behavior while they were incarcerated.

This case is a lesson for all Vietnamese Americans to learn. In America, if anyone offers a huge sum of cash for business, you’d better not take it.

(IRS: Generally, any person in a trade or business who receives more than $10,000 in cash in a single transaction or related transactions must complete a Form 8300, Report of Cash Payments Over $10,000 Received in a Trade or Business. Form 8300 is a joint form issued by the IRS and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network [FinCen] and is used by the government to track individuals that evade taxes and those who profit from criminal activities.)

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