A San Gabriel Valley woman pleaded guilty Wednesday to federal charges for stalking a victim then impersonating him and his wife to further stalk government employees at a U.S. consulate in Vietnam, which she threatened to bomb.
Natalie Nguyen, 39, of Pasadena pleaded guilty in downtown Los Angeles to one count of stalking and one count of threat by interstate commerce to kill another person and to damage and destroy buildings by fire and explosives, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
According to her plea agreement, Nguyen stalked a victim — identified in court documents by the initials T.H. — from April 2023 to February 2024, sending emails threatening to kill him and his wife. One of the emails contained screen shots of a text conversation about paying a hit man $15,000 to kill the victim’s wife, court papers show.
Prosecutors said Nguyen also began stalking five employees at the U.S. consulate in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. At times, she impersonated T.H.’s wife, including in an August 2023 email in which she threatened to “bomb the … consular in Ho Chi Minh City.”
In October 2023, Nguyen — impersonating T.H. and using T.H.’s email account without permission — sent an email to three government employees at the U.S. consulate threatening to kill whoever she believed has “been delaying issuing my wife (a) visa,” papers filed in Los Angeles federal court alleged.
In January 2024, Nguyen — impersonating T.H.’s wife — sent a message to U.S. officials through an online portal stating, “Device will be detonated at America consular in Saigon and in San Francisco. All of you will be exploded for causing my separation with my husband for this last year. Everything will be exploded around new year or after,” according to the plea agreement.
The following month, Nguyen impersonated T.H. and sent an inquiry to a U.S. Embassy online portal threatening to explode grenades around the time of the Lunar New Year at the consulate. Several minutes later, Nguyen, again impersonating T.H., sent an email to the Vietnamese consulate stating she had a grenade set to explode at the consulate, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
U.S. District Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett scheduled a June 18 sentencing hearing, at which time Nguyen will face up to five years in federal prison for the stalking count and up to 10 years for the threats count, federal prosecutors noted.