At 10 AM of Feb 20, a group of around 20 police officers stormed into the private house of killed Le Dinh Kinh in Dong Tam commune, demanding to search his house.
The police officers came with the house search order from the Hanoi City’s Procuracy, reported local human rights defender Trinh Ba Phuong.
As police officers were so aggressive, widow Du Thi Thanh fell into unconsciousness.
Phuong, a land right activist who has close contacts with victims of justice miscarriage in Dong Tam commune, told RFA that when they arrived, the police officers requested elderly Thanh cooperate, before they read the house search warrant which permits police to check the whole house.
However, widow Thanh did not agree. The police officers presented a paper that required her to sign for not cooperating with them.
Phuong also accused that police officers were so rude making widow Thanh’s blood pressure to rise and she fell into unsconsciousness. The video went viral online later on showing that Ms. Thanh’s house had many uniformed police officers and the scene of Ms. Thanh collapsing in front of the police.
Phuong said that a short time later, a nurse came to give Ms. Thanh an injection and the police officers withdrew when many people came to witness the incident. Kinh’s family informed Mr. him that widow Thanh has regained consciousness and is being cared for by her children and grandchildren at home.
RFA tried to contact widow Thanh’s family but the phone calls were not answered.
A week earlier, the Hanoi police also went to Le Dinh Kinh’s house to ask to take away the glass doors which were with many bullet holes on them.
This is the door that the police came on February 12 to ask for confiscation to take to the police station for inspection, but widow Thanh disagreed
As we informed, in the morning of January 9, 2020, thousands of riot police were sent to Hoanh village, Dong Tam commune to protect the fence construction of the Mieu Mon airport, around 3 km away from Dong Tam commune.
At first, the Ministry of Public Security said that the people of Dong Tam used grenades, petrol bombs, and launchers to attack the police forces, resulting in the death of three police officers. Elderly Le Dinh Kinh was shot dead and one was injured.
However, the ministry later said that people attacked the police at the gate of Hoanh village.
The ministry said 22 people were detained in Dong Tam on charges of “murdering,” “resisting people on duty,” and “possessing and using weapons illegally.” Dong Tam residents said the government has been detaining 27 people since January 9 and their families have not received any information from them.
Recently, activists visited Mr. Le Dinh Kinh’s house and witnessed the scene of the incident with their own eyes and requested an independent investigation on the January 9 incident.
