KANCHANABURI, Dec 14 – The Supreme Court released Premchai Karnasuta and two other convicts in their poaching case on bail of 1 million baht each on the condition that they must wear electronic monitoring bracelets and must not leave the country.
Premchai, president of Italian-Thai Development Plc, and his followers were brought from the Thong Pha Phum prison where they were detained over the night of Dec 12. They arrived at the Thong Pha Phum Court to wait for a response of the Supreme Court to their temporary release request. Premchai looked calm and did not answer reporters’ questions.
The three convicts placed 600,000 baht in cash each as their bail bond. The Supreme Court granted bail at 4pm on the condition that they raise their individual bail bond to 1 million baht, stay in the country and wear electronic monitoring devices.
The people were arrested with the carcasses of a black leopard, a kalij pheasant and a barking deer as well as many guns and bullets in the Thung Yai Naresuan Wildlife Sanctuary in Thong Pha Phum district of Kanchanaburi province. They camped there on Feb 4-6, 2018.
The Court of Appeal Region 7 increased the jail term of Premchai from 16 months to two years and 14 months, that of Yong Dodkruea from 13 months to two years and 17 months. The court raised the jail term of Nathee Riamsaen from four months plus a 10,000-baht fine to one year and eight months suspended for two years plus a 40,000-baht fine. The imprisonment term of Thannee Thummat was increased from two years and 17 months to two years and 21 months.
The Appeal Court upheld the first court’s order to fine the four convicts and require them to pay 2 million baht in compensation for damaged natural resources to the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation.
