Theerarak Suthatiwong
Thieves who snatched 40,000 baht from a German on a baht bus found themselves against a formidable opponent when the man’s Thai wife grabbed them and prevented their escape.

The three miscreants were caught again.

Officers from Pattaya Police Station were called out just after midnight on July 6 to the scene of the attempted crime on Second Road, near the Dolphin Roundabout.
The victim, 68-year-old Harry Espis and his wife, Mrs Kannika Polruangthon, 40, together with the baht bus driver were detaining three people who had attempted robbery. They were identified as Suthep Chotang, a 19-year-old transvestite from Banglamung, Ms Chanpen Khanthongdee, 24, from Banglamung, and Mrs Atchara Chansawang, 37. At the scene also was a gray-black Honda Wave motorcycle that they had used in the attempted robbery.
Kannika and her husband stated that they had gone to a beer bar on Pattaya Soi 10. They had stopped to withdraw 40,000 baht from an ATM before taking a baht bus back to the Pattaya Garden Hotel in North Pattaya. Suthep and Chanpen were already in the vehicle. Kannika said she saw as they tried to sit closer to her husband. She didn’t move her eyes from them but still they managed to remove the money from her husband’s trouser pocket without him knowing what had happened. Kannika, however, said she realized, and when the two thieves rang the bell to make their escape she blocked their way.
Atchara had been following on a motorcycle so that the two could make a getaway, but the baht bus driver saw what was happening and ran round to the back of the vehicle to help detain the thieves. In the scuffle, the money fell to the ground.
The three thieves protested their innocence, but checking the records back at the station, police found that the three had committed this type of crime several times before. Once again, they were charged.

Grim find for wife of German man as she returns home drunk

Boonlua Chatree
A German man apparently hanged himself from the entrance door to his house in an act of spite towards his wife, knowing she would be the one to find him when she returned from an evening out.
Banglamung Police Station received a report at 2 a.m. on July 8 from Mrs Yupin Herkommer, 46, from a house at 24/48 Moo 5, Soi Mabyailia 17, saying that her husband had committed suicide by hanging himself from the entrance door.
At the scene officers found the dead body of Wolfgang Michael Herkommer, a 54-year-old German citizen. The corpse was lying at the entrance door wearing blue jeans and a shirt with a black-white design, with signs of something having been tied around its neck. Beside the deceased man were one wooden table and a 5-meter nylon rope hanging from the balcony rail. At the end of the rope was a wide noose. On the table in the living room was a last message from the dead man.
Yupin said in a state of drunkenness that she had had a mild dispute with the deceased before going out to a beer bar in South Pattaya. When she came home she discovered the body. Police have sent the body for autopsy.

Mystery gunman shoots at female reporter

Boonlua Chatree
Police are investigating an incident in which a gunman shot at a female reporter as she was traveling home in her car late at night.
Banglamung Police Station received a report of the shooting at 1:40 a.m. on July 5, and officers hurried to the scene outside Chunlee Battery on Sukhumvit Road in the direction of Pattaya City.

Frightened by the ordeal, Awada (left) looks on as police inspect the scene.

A blue Toyota Yaris was parked at the side of the road with its engine running. There was a bullet hole in the windshield on the driver’s side, and on the console was one empty bullet cartridge. The driver had not been injured, and she was sitting at the side of the road crying in a state of fright. She was identified as Ms Awada Teerapolakul, a 32-year-old reporter and broadcaster at Sophon Cable TV in Pattaya, who lives at Nongplalai.
Awada told the police officers she had gone to Bangkok that morning and returned by Nakhon Chai airbus to North Pattaya, arriving just after midnight. She went to her car, which was parked behind the bus station. Both front tires had no air. She believed that vandals had let the air out of the tires, as the car’s badge had also been removed. She called reporters who she knew in Pattaya, and they came to assist her. It took about half an hour to change the wheels, and then her friends left.
Awada said she had then driven out of the bus station alone to go back to her residence. She saw a man riding a motorcycle in the middle of the road in front of her, and honked for him to give her the right of way. She drove past and continued for a while, but then a motorcycle overtook her car and the rider, a man aged about 30 and wearing a white T-shirt, shot at her. She said she didn’t hear the sound of a shot. Awada said that she thought the rider had thrown a rock at her, breaking the windshield. She stopped the car and discovered a bullet had shattered the glass. The rider observed her from a distance before escaping in the direction of Banglamung Police Station. She was afraid and called her friends for assistance, and notified the police.
Awada stated in tears that she didn’t have a problem with anyone. There was no cause for anyone to be angry enough to take her life, even though she worked as a local reporter and announcer.
The officers took her to Banglamung Police Station, and when she had regained her composure they questioned her. Police believe that the shooting may have been for personal, rather than professional reasons. The gunman may have had problems with his intended victim, and decided to frighten or injure her, or possibly even to kill her. It was likely he had let the air out of her car tires. Or it could have just been that the motorcyclist had become angry when she honked at him, and had fired at her in a fit of road rage.
Police are checking the CCTV camera that has been installed at the Sukhumvit intersection, which the victim and the gunman would have driven past. They are also questioning Awada more closely to see if there is anyone who could conceivably have a grievance against her.

Three questioned over murder of Dutchman

Boonlua Chatree
Police are investigating the gruesome murder of a Dutchman who had been stabbed and his body set on fire before his killers robbed the man’s house and fled.
Banglamung Police Station received a report at 6 p.m. on July 7 of smoke coming from house number 68/5 at Moo 1 in Nongplalai, and a team of officers led by station superintendent Pol Col Sarayut Sanguanpokai went to investigate.
Arriving at the scene, a single-story house surrounded by a fence, the officers found the door locked, and had to force their way in. A dead man was found in the bathroom. He was identified as Martinus Johannes Gerardus Antonius, age 64, of Dutch nationality. He was lying on his back in the bathroom and was partially unclothed. The corpse was badly burnt and a one meter long sword was still imbedded in his neck.
Signs of a struggle were found in the house, and the drawers and the dresser had been ransacked. Police estimated there had been at least two intruders. They had stabbed and slashed the deceased then burned his body before escaping with the valuables they found in the house.
Two men and one woman seen running from the house were questioned at 10 p.m. on the same day, but no one has yet been charged with the murder and police are continuing their inquiries.

Thailand and Laos step up joint anti-drugs measures

Agree to expand cooperation

Sawittree Namwiwatsuk
Thailand and Laos will work more closely together to suppress the trafficking of narcotics along the Mekong River, which forms the border between the two countries, and to prevent the drugs traveling through or from Cambodia.

Soubanh Srithirath (left) from Laos and Sompong Amornvivat (right) from Thailand agree to increase anti-drugs cooperation between the two countries.

July 10 saw the 11th Bilateral Meeting for Cooperation on the Suppression of Narcotics between Thailand and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, held at the Dusit Thani Hotel Pattaya and hosted by the Office of Protection and Suppression of Narcotics at the Ministry of Justice.
Thailand’s Minister of Justice Sompong Amornvivat and Soubanh Srithirath, Minister in the President’s Office of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic jointly chaired the meeting.
The talks were divided into two levels, one session for senior officials and the other for the ministers, and the overall program was designed to create an operational plan for the following year to reinforce the Border Liaison Office for Suppression of Narcotics.
The meeting agreed to expand cooperation to prevent the smuggling of drugs by or via Cambodia, and the ministers agreed there should be an operational meeting between Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia for greater cooperation in the suppression of narcotics in the region.
Thailand and Laos agreed that there should be joint patrols along the banks of the Mekong, not only to stop the smuggling of drugs but also to collect information that would lead to the breaking up of dealer networks.
Sompong said that the Thai government had supported a budget of 24.5 million baht to construct an addict treatment and rehabilitation center in Jampasak District in 2004, and that the center was handed over to the Lao government after completion on December 16, 2005. The Public Health Ministry of Thailand is responsible for technical support, and the operation of the center.
The Thai government has now presented a further amount of 994,580 baht for materials and equipment at the center.

City to form child protection committee

Criminal child abuse cases on the rise

Pramote Channgam
Pattaya is to organize a local subcommittee under the National Child Protection Committee in a move to try and remove the risks to homeless and underprivileged children.

Assistant permanent secretary of Pattaya City Chanatpong Juabmee.

Assistant permanent secretary of Pattaya City Chanatpong Juabmee chaired a meeting on July 9 in the Thappraya Meeting Room at Pattaya City Hall to discuss ways of organizing the subcommittee with the help of both the public and private sectors.
Ms Pannee Limcharoen, director of the Pattaya Social Welfare Department said that the problems with vagabond and underprivileged children are growing, and that criminal case statistics for child abuse are continually on the rise.
Abuses of children by foreign visitors is an area of great concern, and the number of cases in Pattaya involving children between the ages of seven and 15 are increasing at an alarming rate.
Formation of a Pattaya subcommittee for the protection of children would come under Section 15 Paragraph 1 of the Child Protection Act BE2546 (2003).
Dr Sumon Nakchalerm from Somdej Phranangchaosirikit Hospital said that under the Child Protection Act, Pattaya City would be entitled to cooperation from all organizations to get to the real problem.

Four Navy special units undertake joint anti-terrorism training

Ensuring personnel and technology are in a state of readiness

No, they’re not extras in a 1950s alien horror movie; they
are military anti-terrorist experts going through training exercises.

Patcharapol Panrak
Four Royal Navy units began joint anti-terrorism training exercises on July 4 at the Boathouse of the Royal Special Warfare Group in Samaesarn Sub-district.
The Attack Squadron from Special Warfare Operations, the Bomb Rescue Group from the Ordnance Department, the Biological Attack Protection Unit from the Naval Science Department, and a Mobile Medical Unit from the Naval Medical Department were working together under simulated conditions to prepare for any real situation that might occur.
Rear Admiral Chaiwat Phuthong, director of the Naval Science Department officially opened the exercises at the Boathouse. The training was scheduled for 12 days, and was due to take place on the HTMS Similan, the passenger terminal building at International Utapao Airport, and on the Fogger M 400 of the Royal Thai Naval Air Division.
The aim is to ensure that personnel and technology are in a state of readiness for any terrorism related incidents that might occur, and to ensure that the four units work smoothly together during any such operations. The unit commanders were therefore on the alert for any possible obstructions that might occur in the chain of command or in assigning duties, or any other complication that could occur when the four units were working together under emergency conditions.
On the first day, Rear Admiral Chaiwat attended a demonstration for the destruction of an improvised explosive device (IED). This was done with a high water vapor pressure bullet. In the simulation, those injured by the bomb were assisted, and chemical leaks were eradicated.

IT teaching to be improved in city schools

Lack of standards, teachers and equipment to be rectified

Vimolrat Singnikorn
A standard syllabus for computers and information technology is to be devised for Pattaya schools as the Pattaya Education Department is aware that teaching on this important subject does not meet necessary standards.

Director of the Education Department Tawatchai Rattanyoo (left) and educational supervisor Wannapa Wannasri are calling for better computer education in local schools.

A conference was held on July 9 at Pattaya City Hall, headed by director of the Education Department Tawatchai Rattanyoo and educational supervisor Wannapa Wannasri to formulate strategy and goals for a new IT syllabus.
Teachers associated with information technology from the 10 Pattaya City schools attended the meeting for consultation.
Wannapa said that it is important at this stage to devise a standard syllabus across all of the city’s schools to make sure they are heading in a uniform direction at each level, and that the subject is receiving the attention that it needs.
The meeting discussed the current IT teaching at each school. Pattaya School No 7 was discussed as one example. The school has arranged the computer course into two levels, primary school classes 1-3, and primary school classes 4-6. The students are taught use of software such as Microsoft Word and Microsoft Power Point, and were able to pass tests on practical application, but often failed on theory.
It was also found that some schools didn’t have enough computers to teach many students at the same time, and some of them such as Pattaya School No 10 had no teachers qualified in computer instruction.
Tawatchai said that Pattaya City has already procured more than 100 sets of computers, and these would be installed in schools soon. Regarding the lack of teachers, additional personnel will be hired.