NINE police officers were suspended from duty after a Vanuatu citizen complained that they had extorted over 5 million baht from him to drop charges of being linked to passport forgery which he denied, Naewna newspaper and TV Channel 3 Plus News said this evening (Nov. 5).
Pol. Lt. Gen. Thanayut Wutticharasathamrong, assistant national police chief acting on behalf of the national police chief, signed an order temporarily suspending nine policemen with one being a lieutenant colonel performing as an investigation inspector at a police station in Nakhon Ratchasima Province; two lieutenants who are deputy inspectors at Crime Suppression Division, Technology Crime Suppression Division 1; a deputy inspector for crime suppression at a police station in Bangkok; five police sergeants and one sergeant major.
A committee has been set up to investigate them after Mr. Sai (surname withheld), a Vanuatu national, complained that they had extorted money from him to drop charges of being linked to passport forgery as alleged by four Filipino suspects who had been arrested for holding fake passports had implicated him.
He said that on Oct. 16 eight men claiming to be policemen accompanied by two interpreters brought a warrant to search his house in Samut Prakan.
They seized the mobile phones of everyone in the house, which aside from Sai and his wife included two Chinese friends and a foreign maid, as well as a computer.
They also threatened to slap an additional charge of hiring a foreign maid without permission.
They then demanded 300 million baht, or US$10 million in digital currency. However Sai negotiated and paid US149,253.
The next day one of the interpreters contacted Sai saying if he paid another 700,000 baht they would file charges against the person who had reported him but in the end he was scammed again.
Photo: Thai Rath
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