Chilling countdown: Ransom messages sent before Bankstown kidnapping and murder of 45-year-old mother Thi Kim Tran
The moments leading up to the terrifying kidnapping and murder of a mother-of-two have been revealed.
Thi Kim Tran, 45, was murdered after being kidnapped from her home on Edward St in Bankstown — in Sydney’s southwest — on April 17, in front of her two children.
The Daily Telegraph reported that Tran’s husband was sent ransom messages 20 minutes, 10 minutes and five minutes before her death.
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However, the countdown texts never reached him.
“It’s unclear if he was out of service range or what, but he didn’t receive them,” a police source told the masthead.
The man was away on an interstate work trip at the time, which police allege was connected to a large-scale drug manufacturing network he was involved in.
He had reportedly worked with the group for months but had fallen into conflict with a senior figure in the network.
Police are investigating whether the kidnapping was an attempt to force the man to pay off a drug debt that had been chased for weeks.
Police said Tran and her two children “had no knowledge” of the man’s alleged involvement with the group, which was made up of “mainly Vietnamese males”.
A group of five armed men broke into their home, struck Tran’s eight-year-old son in the head with a baseball bat, then stripped Tran naked and dragged her from the house about 10.30pm.
She was forced into the back seat of an SUV at gunpoint.
Her body was later found in a burnt-out car in Beverly Hills, about 6km from her home.
While a bullet casing was found on the floor of the burnt car, no bullet wounds could be found on Tran’s body.
Police allege that the group Nguyen was involved with operated a methamphetamine manufacturing lab based in Victoria.
Following the murder, officers raided the alleged drug lab in Springdallah, seizing items consistent with methamphetamine manufacturing.
The Daily Telegraph also reported that weeks before the killing, a group of men stormed the farmhouse in Springdallah searching for Nguyen.
No arrests were made from the raid and Nguyen is not facing any charges relating to the raid nor Tran’s death.
Originally published on 7NEWS
