The Silver Pheasant Case: Who is Truly at Fault?

The case of the silver pheasants involving Thái Khắc Thành offers an excellent insight into the practice of legal reasoning, specifically in the Việt Nam context. Usually, the words “wrongful conviction” or “miscarriage of justice” evoke stark, binary terms: one side entirely wrong, the other entirely right; one side wholly evil, the other wholly good.

 In reality, few cases in this world allow for such sharp black-and-white lines, and even if such a division does exist, it is often only along a single dimension of the issue.

Guilty or Not Guilty

A court's verdict of “guilty” or “not guilty” is not merely a reflection of whether someone committed an act, but an application of core legal principles. Three are particularly relevant to this case:

Favorable legal changes apply retroactively. If the law changes in a way that benefits a defendant between the time of the act and the trial, the new law must be applied.

Ignorance of the law is not a defense. An individual cannot use their lack of knowledge to excuse a violation.

Crimes must be defined by law at the time of the act. One can only be guilty of a crime that exists in the Penal Code.

In 2024, when Thái Khắc Thành bought three silver pheasants, the law was unambiguous. The species was classified as a “critically endangered, precious, and rare species prioritized for protection” (Group IB) under Decree 84/2021/NĐ-CP. [1]

Thành himself admitted in testimony that he knew the species was protected but proceeded anyway, satisfying the elements for the crime of “violating regulations on the protection of endangered, precious, and rare species” (Article 244 of the 2015 Penal Code). Rooted in Vietnam’s CITES Convention obligations, the law itself was not in dispute. [2]

The People’s Court of District 5 in Hưng Yên sentenced Thành to six years in prison and a 30 million đồng fine on Aug. 8, 2025. This first-instance judgment is not yet legally effective, as both Thành and the People’s Procuracy have challenged the verdict, demanding an appeal and a new investigation. [3] [4] Thành has since been released on bail pending further proceedings.

Wrong Judgment, Not Wrongful Conviction

It might have appeared that the trial court got it right—the right person and the right crime—but through carelessness, the judgment was mistaken. The reason is simple: about six weeks before the verdict, the law had changed. In a move that blindsided the court, two ministries issued Circular 27/2025/TT-BNNPTNT-BTNMT, effective July 1. [5]

With this new rule, the silver pheasant—just in time to save Thành—leapt from the “strictly prohibited” list to a less protected category. Specifically, it was reclassified from a Group IB species to a Group IIB species.

This seemingly minor bureaucratic change had a massive legal impact. The crime Thành was charged with, Article 244 (“violating regulations on the protection of endangered, precious, and rare species”), applies only to Group IB species. Since the bird was no longer in that category by the time of trial, the charge was no longer valid. The court, perhaps too busy to notice the change, failed to apply the new law that should have benefited the defendant.

To understand the significance of these categories, one must look at how Vietnam protects its wildlife. The system, based on the international CITES treaty which Vietnam joined in 1994, has since been incorporated into the country’s domestic law through forestry and biodiversity legislation. [6][7][8] 

It divides endangered species into two main groups: 

• Group II for species with restricted use. 
• Group I for species strictly prohibited from commercial use, and 

This reclassification moved the silver pheasant from full protection to partial protection.

Even a reinvestigation under another law, Article 234 (“violating regulations on the protection of wildlife”), would have likely failed. That article requires a transaction value over 150 million đồng; Thành’s deal was worth less than 10 million. At most, he was guilty of an administrative violation deserving a fine, not prison. This is why the case represents a “wrong judgment,” not a wrongful conviction. And yet, this farcical case has another layer of complexity still to be explored.

Ignorance of the Law, or a Law Impossible to Know

Upon his release on bail, Thái Khắc Thành declared to the press that he never knew raising silver pheasants was illegal, stating, “I never thought keeping a few birds would be such a serious matter, It was only after officials explained it to me that I understood.” [9] 

While he may escape conviction on a technicality, it will not be because of his claim. A foundational principle of law is that ignorance is not a valid defense.

Yet, from another perspective, if seasoned judges failed to recognize the new Circular 27, blaming a farmer for his lack of knowledge seems harsh. The principle that citizens must know the law is predicated on the state’s duty to make laws accessible and clear. In the case of the silver pheasant, the regulations are so immensely confusing.

The source of this confusion is a tangled legislative handover. Previously, the bird's legal status was clearly defined in a high-level government document, Decree No. 84/2021/NĐ-CP. [10] However, the government then issued a new decree, No. 136/2025/NĐ-CP, which delegated the authority to classify endangered species to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. [11]

Acting on this new authority, the ministry issued Circular No. 27, which reclassified the silver pheasant from the "strictly prohibited" Group IB down to the "restricted" Group IIB. This created a direct legal contradiction: the new circular conflicted with the older Decree 84, which remained in effect. The silver pheasant was now simultaneously in two different legal categories under two valid documents.

Resolving such a legal overlap typically involves a clear principle: the higher-level document prevails (lex superior derogat legi inferiori). By this logic, the government's Decree 84 should have overridden the ministry's Circular 27. But it did not. The circular, though lower in hierarchy, derived its legitimacy from the newer Decree 136. Because Decree 136 is more recent than Decree 84, the rules it authorized—namely, Circular 27—take priority.

The timing made this legal maze nearly impossible to navigate. Both Decree 136 and Circular 27 took effect on July 1, just two months after the new decree was issued and a mere six weeks before Thành's trial. Issuing laws in such a hasty, "blitzkrieg" fashion is a headache for the public and the legal system alike. If prosecutors, lawyers, and judges failed to apply the correct law, perhaps 70–80 percent of the blame should rest with those who drafted it.

The Silver Pheasant Case - A Recap

• In 2024, after learning on social media that the silver pheasant was a rare species, Thái Khắc Thành of Nghệ An acquired three birds and began breeding them without authorization. 
• In March 2025, he was arrested in Thái Bình while attempting to sell ten chicks he had posted for sale on Facebook. 
• The People’s Court of Hưng Yên subsequently sentenced him to six years in prison, a ruling that caused public opinion to explode.
• The outcry was validated by a crucial detail: a new law, Circular 27/2025, had taken effect on July 1 2025, downgrading the pheasant’s protected status. 
• In a rare move, the provincial court has now petitioned to overturn its own judgment, and Thành has been released on a travel ban pending reinvestigation.

Đan Thanh wrote two articles on this topic in Vietnamese and published them in Luật Khoa Magazine on August 16, 2025, and August 18, 2025, respectively. Đàm Vĩnh Hằng translated them into English for The Vietnamese Magazine.