Disturbing twist after Sydney mother was murdered (2025)

72 shares

Police claim that the husband of a Sydney mother who was kidnapped and murdered in a 'clearly targeted' attack at her home was actively involved in an organised crime group.

Thi Kim Tran, 45, was taken from her Bankstown home in south-westSydneyon Thursday night and forced to strip naked in her driveway before being taken away at gunpoint in an SUV.

Her badly burnt body was later found in a burnt-out car in the nearby suburb of Beverly Hills. Police cannot rule out that she was burned alive.

The armed kidnappers assaulted an eight-year-old boy with a baseball bat so severely he had to be placed into an induced coma after undergoing surgery for serious head injuries.

The child may suffer 'long-life complications' as a result of his injuries.

Another child, a 15-year-old boy, was not physically injured during the incident, but was so traumatised by the attack he remains in hospital where he is undergoing treatment.

NSW Homicide Squad Superintendent Joe Doueihi said Ms Tran was not known to police and had no prior criminal history.

However, her husband had links to an organised crime network and had been involved in minor drug offences, Superintendent Doueihi said.

Police said tensions escalated between Ms Tran’s husband and the organised crime group when he allegedly stole drugs from the same group he was working with.

'We are investigating a conflict between the male partner … and other members of the organised crime group,' he said.

The criminal network was based in Victoria and was believed to be involved with large-scale methamphetamine manufacturing, Superintendent Doueihi said.

He said there was 'no information or evidence to suggest that the upper echelons of the organised crime group are linked to South-East Asian crime groups' despite the majority of members being Vietnamese.

Superintendent Doueihi confirmed that Victoria Police, working with NSW Police, had raided a rural property in Springdallah - 30 kilometres south of Ballarat in western Victoria - and found evidence suggesting it was used as a drug lab.

The two children 'had no knowledge' of thir dad's alleged involvement with the group,Superintendent Doueihi said.

Tran's husband, who was interstate on a business trip at the time of the attack, had allegedly been working for the organised crime network when the 45-year-old was killed.

No charges have been filed against him.

'These offences are clearly targeted offences,'Superintendent Doueihi told reporters.

'They're callous, they're brutal and they're offences against innocent people ... these organised crime groups are breaking their own code of conduct by targeting innocent women and children.'

Tributes have flooded in for the mother as loved ones called on the police to 'quickly return justice'.

In a post shared on social media a friend said she had been 'left with grief' over what happened to Ms Tran, who moved to Australia from Vietnam more than 10 years ago.

'If one day your best friend leaves you forever, you will cry,' she wrote.

It is not suggested that the claims by the police about the husband are true, only that the police have made them and that they are being investigated.

Sydney

Add your comment