06 September 2004 :

Le Van Thanh, a 54 year old Vietnamese farmer, was sentenced to death for murdering his lover and attempting to rape her 15-year-old daughter after a bitter quarrel. Thanh was found guilty by the People's Court of the southern Tien Giang province following a one-day trial. The attack happened after his 36-year-old lover, Tran Thi Loan, walked out on him earlier in the year after he tried to rape one of her two teenage daughters from her first marriage, the official said. Thanh begged her to return but she refused. Enraged, he set fire to her house on April 12, 2004, while she and one of her daughters were sleeping. Loan suffered extensive burns and died in a Ho Chi Minh City hospital 10 days later. Her daughter was also badly injured.