School, parents duck for cover
A Saraburi teenager discovered the 14-year-old boy she was seeing was not all he seemed -- a monster hiding beneath the veneer of a trusted friend.
The boy and five of his friends raped the girl after luring her to a local house on Feb 19, the girl's mother, "B", told reporters last week.
Activist Chalida Palamat, also known as Ton Ao, took the mother and the victim, Nong "A", to see Nong Khae police to check on their probe.
They had yet to make any arrests, upsetting the girl's mother. Worse, the boys' schools and parents had shown little interest in taking responsibility.
On the day of the attack, Nong A had asked her grandmother if she could go out to buy snacks with friends.
After several hours passed without her return, the mother contacted her daughter's friends, who were unaware of her whereabouts.
About 10pm, a boy brought her daughter back home, and her father asked where she had been.
Nong A initially refused to tell him, so her father hit her. She finally admitted that the boy who took her, whom she had been seeing for 2-3 months, had asked her to go for a ride on his bike.
She had been out with him before without any problems, so agreed to go again.
However, on this occasion the boy took her to a house where five other boys from different schools were present. They took turns raping her, the mother said.
The boy who took A there, she said, asked for sex first, and said if she objected he would refuse to take her home.
Frightened, she agreed. The boy then invited his five friends waiting in another room to rape her too. The boys were aged 12 to 15.
"The kids threatened her, saying if she told anyone they would kill her and her family," Ton Ao said.
Her mother took A to complain to Nong Khae police. However, she said the case has made little progress.
Given the indifference she met when she contacted parents and schools involved, she was worried the case would slip between the cracks.
Ton Ao, who also took along officials from the Department of Children and Youth and the Social Development and Human Security Office in Saraburi to meet police, said she had contacted one of the schools concerned.
The school director claimed that as the attack occurred off school grounds, he would not get involved. The students also had not attended classes for a month.
Ton Ao, however, said the students were still enrolled at his school and the director should help the probe by providing information about the boys and contacting their parents, rather than shirking responsibility.
As for the parents, one told her that she should go to the police and get her son arrested herself.
Ton Ao said the parents should show more duty of care. "In some cases, parents can be legally responsible when their children offend and they have failed to exercise any supervision or control," she added.
That afternoon, police investigators brought in two of the parents concerned for questioning, which took about an hour. Their three children, named as among the offenders, later took them to the house where the attack occurred.
A child and family welfare officer from Saraburi was also present at the station. She spoke to A, who is recovering.
If A wished to see a psychiatrist, she would arrange it. The province would also discuss providing compensation to the family, a human security officer from the regional office said, along with arrangements for her further education.
The case continues.
Turning a blind eye
Police uncover the kratom juice bottling plant and the red police box, inset.
A Nonthaburi vendor making kratom juice and peddling e-cigarettes on an industrial scale was operating right under the noses of local police.
Provincial Police Division 1 last week raided a shop selling kratom and e-cigarettes, operating openly in Soi Wat Chaloem Phra Kiat under the jurisdiction of Bang Si Muang police.
Villagers knew, but police (supposedly) did not, as one newspaper report put it.
A police box, attached to the fence of the house, advises that the area falls under the local station's jurisdiction.
Provincial police, who turned up to search the two-storey house as part of a government-initiated crackdown on vaping, found a Thai caretaker and three Lao workers there.
They were manufacturing and selling the illicit goods to local teens, reports said. Handily, the shop is also near a local school.
Sitthasak Jamphatip, 34, identified himself as the caretaker. The search revealed 310 bottles of kratom stored in a refrigerator and a large ice container, 614 bottles of liquid cough syrup used to mix with the kratom, 54 empty cough syrup bottles, and 1,037 pieces of kratom boiling equipment.
Inside the house, police also found 1,095 e-cigarettes and pouches of e-liquid.
Next to the house, Mr Sitthasak had set up a spot for boiling and packaging kratom, equipped with pots and burners, and kept a large number of plastic bottles for packaging kratom.
Under questioning, Mr Sitthasak said he was not the owner but was hired to take care of the place and sell kratom to customers. He claimed the e-cigarettes were kept by the owner and not for sale.
He had been working there for about a year, earning 600 baht a day, while the two Lao workers responsible for boiling and packaging kratom earned 300 baht a day. The third Lao worker was a housekeeper. Police seized the items and sent the suspects to Bang Si Muang police for legal proceedings.
Nasty way to go
The narrow crevasse where Somporn met this fate.
A Surin man fond of a drink died in a tight squeeze when he fell off a wall outside his house, his neighbour says.
The body of Somporn (no surname provided) 56, was found wedged in a wall crevice behind his rental room in Sangkha district on March 2.
Prapakorn Phunpha, 40, his neighbour and the first person to discover the body, said Somporn, who was fond of a drink, was in the habit of climbing onto the wall to relieve himself.
On this occasion, he appears to have lost his balance and fallen into the narrow gap between the wall and the back of his place, where he suffocated.
The crevasse is about 20cm wide.
Rescue workers were unable to pull the body out and had to go around the back, which was overgrown with bushes. They broke the wall to retrieve the body.
No signs of foul play were found, and Somporn was thought to have been dead for at least 7-8 hours.
Mr Prapakorn said he heard the sound of running water about 10am, so decided to check. When he looked into the victim's room, he saw no one inside. However, he noticed it was locked with a latch from the inside.
Feeling suspicious, he went up to the second floor and leaned out the window, where he saw Somporn stuck in the wall crevice.
He assumed Somporn must have fallen around 1-2am because he thought he heard the sound of someone knocking on the wall. However, he didn't pay much attention. He didn't find the body until 10am, when it was too late.
