Viet Refugee’s Surprise Plea Averts Trial : He’s Pronounced Guilty of Attempted Murder in 1986 Shooting

Averting a trial that had threatened to open old war wounds, an Orange County Vietnamese refugee on Thursday effectively pleaded guilty to attempted murder in connection with what prosecutors described as a failed assassination.

The surprise development in Superior Court in Santa Ana means that Be Tu Van Tran, 33, could be sentenced next month to up to nine years in prison. But the Costa Mesa man’s lawyer said he is confident from discussions with the judge that Tran will face only a few months in a local jail and probation.

An ardent anti-communist whose family was jailed by the Hanoi regime, Tran had acknowledged in a disputed admission to police that he shot and seriously wounded a fellow refugee who had been quoted publicly as favoring normalized relations with the communist regime in Vietnam.

Prosecutors portrayed Tran as a cadet in a dangerous right-wing Vietnamese group whose stated aim is to “exterminate” communists and “restore” their homeland. Tran was tried first in 1986, but a mistrial was declared because of juror misconduct.

His lawyer had maintained that Tran had nothing to do with the March, 1986, shooting of Tran Khanh Van in Westminster. A former Saigon housing minister, Van established a successful local real estate practice, but drew the wrath of some local refugees when he was quoted in a Los Angeles Times Magazine article as suggesting that working with future leaders in Hanoi was “the only way to change Vietnam’s repressive Marxism.”

Tran accepted responsibility for the shooting of Van as a “badge of honor” in the fight against communism, defense attorney Robert Weinberg said in earlier interviews. He depicted the soft-spoken truck driver as a political martyr.

Tran was seen as a hero by some people in the Little Saigon area of Westminster and Garden Grove, gaining financial support for his defense and becoming the subject of a laudatory book. As a result, his plea in court Thursday drew mixed reactions from supporters.

Tran Minh Cong, a prominent local refugee who is secretary general of the Orange County-based Movement for Human Rights in Vietnam, said he doubts that Tran shot Van, but said he thought Tran’s plea was for the best.

Pointing to the intense and sometimes divisive emotions stirred by the Tran case, Cong said: “People can leave this all behind and go on with their lives.”

Superior Court Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald indicated that that was his intent when, during pretrial motions in the case, he surprised attorneys Wednesday by suggesting that they avoid a trial altogether. “It is the court’s hope that we can settle this case and perhaps heal some of the wounds in the Vietnamese community,” he said.

Under a little-used legal mechanism known as a “slow plea,” Tran agreed Thursday to give up his right to a jury trial and, without putting on a defense, let Fitzgerald decide the case based on transcripts from his preliminary hearing.

In court Thursday, Orange County Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher Evans made clear to Tran that his agreement to the legal maneuver was “tantamount to a plea of guilty. . . . You are in fact incriminating yourself and, in all probability, admitting you committed the crime.”

Tran nodded his head and said he understood. Fitzgerald then pronounced him guilty of attempted murder.