A former primary school teacher in Vietnam was given a life sentence on Monday after being found guilty of raping several girls.
In November 2018, Nguyen Quang Chung, 50, was found guilty of raping several third-graders for more than one year and was sentenced to 24 years in jail, VN Express reported. Prosecutors appealed the sentence and demanded a heavier sentence.
On April 8, an appeal court in Da Nang overturned the lower court’s ruling and sentenced him to life in prison. Chung, an ethics teacher, reportedly invited several third-grade students to his office during break time and raped them for more than a year until March 2016.
Le Thi Thanh Thao, the principal of the school at the time, said she had spoken with the students and acknowledged the details of the crime. She said Chung would ask the students to clean his office or to meet him in the computer room.
Official reports estimate one in four children in Vietnam are victims of abuse. At least 1,300 cases of sexual abuse against children are reported in Vietnam every year.