VIETNAMESE police say two Samoans used fake Australian passports to assassinate Sydney gangster Lorenzo Lemalu in Ho Chi Minh City this week on orders from abroad.
Vaa Vaa, 27, and Tafia Steve, 23, entered Vietnam through Tan Son Nhat International Airport on May 14 using fake passports and false names.
Police say eight locals have been arrested for helping the Samoans flee after the fatal shooting in a restaurant. A second person who was shot at the restaurant is in hospital in a critical condition.
Authorities said the men are also being reported under the names Steve Tofa and Joseph Va’a, and that they were tracked down near the Vietnam-Cambodia border less than 72 hours after the killing.
Police said the suspects confessed during questioning and admitted they carried out the shooting under the direction of an individual abroad.
If found guilty, the men face between seven years and life in prison.
Investigators said the pair spent days monitoring the movements of their targets before opening fire outside Cee’f Restaurant on Truong Dinh Street in Ben Thanh Ward on the evening of May 21.
Eight detained as probe widens
The eight people detained include a passenger transport driver on the Ho Chi Minh City-Tay Ninh route, and seven Vietnamese nationals.
Police allege they failed to report the crime or helped the suspects escape after the shooting.
Lieutenant General Mai Hoang, director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Public Security, said investigators used digital mapping and coordinated with units under the Ministry of Public Security to reconstruct the suspects’ movements before and after the attack.
“The two Samoans were captured while hiding near the border and later brought back to Ho Chi Minh City for further investigation.”
Victims identified as Australians with gang links
Police said Lemalu, 25, was shot twice and died at the scene, while Sauni Sam, 27, was shot once and remains in critical condition in the hospital.
Vietnamese police said the killing involved military-grade weapons and described the suspects as highly professional and extremely violent.
Australian media have reported that Lemalu, also known as Renzo, was suspected by Australian police of being a senior member of a Sydney organised crime group.
He had been linked to the Coconut Cartel, which has conflicted with the Alameddine crime network, and his death has fueled speculation in Sydney about whether the attack was tied to that feud, the cartel’s wider alliances, or a contract killing ordered from overseas.
A separate post on social media from a suspected cartel figure, Anthony Pele, referred to Lemalu as “The Coconut” and described him as “a true warrior and a true man in my eyes.”
Rare shooting in a country with strict gun laws
Shootings are unusual in communist Vietnam, where private gun ownership is illegal, and the public is routinely encouraged to surrender weapons to authorities.
Police said the investigation remains open and that all people connected to the case will be dealt with strictly under Vietnamese law.
Authorities had initially announced they were hunting two Australian nationals named Lang Kenny Trong Minh Do and Justin John White, before later identifying the detained suspects as Samoan nationals who had entered under false identities.
The probe is now focused on who ordered the killing, how the suspects were assisted on the ground, and whether the shooting was linked to organised crime in Sydney or a wider international network.
