Van Tuong Nguyen

Van Tuong Nguyen (Vietnamese: Nguyễn Tường Vân, ; 17 August 1980 – 2 December 2005), baptised Caleb, was an Australian from Melbourne, Victoria convicted of drug trafficking in Singapore.

A Vietnamese Australian, he was also addressed as Nguyen Tuong-van (阮祥雲) in the Singaporean media, his name in Vietnamese custom, as well as in most Asian customs.

In 1987, she married a Vietnamese-Australian who beat them often, according to Nguyen.

Van was educated at St Ignatius School in Richmond, St Joseph's Primary School in Springvale and Mount Waverley Secondary College.

After leaving school at 18, he intended to study at Deakin University, but financial difficulties led him to work as a store clerk, door-to-door salesman, computer salesman and research marketer.

Van started his own computer sales business in 1999.

After his brother Khoa got into legal trouble, Van wound up the business.

He then found a sales, research and marketing job and earned between A$1,500 to A$2,500 a month (depending on how much commission he received).

He did not know his father until 2001 when he travelled from the United States to Australia.

His mother, Kim, is Vietnamese and migrated to Australia shortly after the boys' birth.

He subsequently took long leave between June and December 2002.

In his confession, he stated he was on "medication for acne that required 4 months leave".

Throughout his trial, Van claimed that he was carrying the drugs in a bid to pay off debts amounting to approximately A$20,000 to A$25,000 that he owed and to repay legal fees his twin brother Khoa (a former heroin addict) had incurred in defending drug-trafficking and other criminal charges including an attack on a Pacific Islander youth with a katana.

In addition to his own financial troubles, Van said he tried to help pay his twin brother's debt of A$12,000.

His twin brother's loan had to be repaid by the end of 2002.

Van could afford to repay only A$4,000, the interest on the loan.

By October 2002, Van had been out of a job for four months and sustaining expenses which included interest on the loan and personal living costs, all totaling A$580 a month.

In November 2002, Van met with a Chinese man named "Tan" in the food court of Box Hill central mall who told him to travel to Sydney to meet a Vietnamese man named "Sun".

Sun proposed that he would repay Van's loans if Nguyen transported packages from Cambodia back to Melbourne and possibly Sydney, via Singapore.

The man said the packages contained "white", which Van understood to be heroin.

It was Van's first trip overseas from Australia since his immigration.

He reached Phnom Penh at midday on 3 December 2002 after leaving Sydney in the evening of the previous day.

He met with a Cambodian man at the Lucky Burger restaurant on 4 December and was taken by car to a garage where he was forced to smoke some powdered heroin.

The following day, Van met his associates at the Lucky Burger and was again taken to the garage and ordered by the men to consume heroin, perhaps to help them determine if he was an undercover police officer.

Van was instructed to stay in Phnom Penh until 10 December, at which point he was to meet at the Lucky Burger.

On 8 December, he decided to fly to Ho Chi Minh City.

On 10 December he returned to Phnom Penh, but missed his scheduled meeting at the Lucky Burger.

On 11 December he was taken to the garage, where he was then instructed on how to crush heroin bricks and to strap the powdered drug packages to his body.

The rest of the day was spent crushing and packaging the drugs in his hotel room.

He checked out of the hotel the next day and went to the airport.

On boarding his flight to Melbourne after a four-hour stopover at Singapore Changi Airport, Van triggered a metal detector.

A package of heroin from Cambodia was found strapped to his body.

After the first package was discovered, Van informed the airport official about a second package in his luggage.

Van confessed to have in his possession 396.2g of heroin, more than 26 times the amount of heroin that mandates a death sentence under the Misuse of Drugs Act (Illegal traffic, import or export of Heroin of more than 15 grams).

The Singaporean High Court sentenced Van to death for this crime on 20 March 2004.

After he was convicted, Van was held on death row in Changi Prison.

An appeal to the Court of Appeal was rejected on 20 October 2004.

Drug trafficking carries a mandatory death sentence under Singapore's Misuse of Drugs Act, and despite pleas for clemency from the Australian Government, Amnesty International, the Holy See, as well as other individuals and groups, he was executed by hanging at 06:06 SST on 2 December 2005 at Changi Prison (22:06 UTC, 1 December 2005).

Van Tuong Nguyen and his twin brother, Dang Khoa Nguyen, were born in a refugee camp at Songkhla in Thailand to Vietnamese parents.

Van's family received a registered letter from the Singapore Prison Service, notifying of his scheduled hanging on 2 December 2005.