Police accused of extortion, caught on video

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PUBLISHED: 18 Jul 2023 at 13:51

Two men in police uniforms seen in video taken surreptitiously during the raid on a resort room in Kalasin province where a woman was staying alone on July 4. Five officers are accused of falsely accusing her of drug possession and demanding 50,000 baht to let her go. (Captured from a video on Khaosan Palanchai Facebook)

A police investigation has been opened into an allegation that five police officers in Kalasin province abducted a woman, falsely accused her of drug possession and extorted 50,000 baht from her in exchange for her release.

Major General Pol Phuttiphong Musikul, deputy commander of Region 4 of the provincial police, said on Tuesday that the incident occurred in an area under the jurisdiction of Muang police station in Kalasin, and that the commander of the station had reported it to the regional police office.

The allegation is supported by a video taken surreptitiously with a mobile phone.

The five men in the video were police officers attached to various police units in Kalasin province. A fact-finding investigation is being opened to examine the disciplinary and criminal measures against the accused.

If the allegation was confirmed, they would be punished, Pol Maj Gen Phuttiphong said.

The investigation was launched after the woman turned to Khaosan Palanchai’s Facebook page for help. Channel 8 then sent a news crew to see her, and the alleged extortion by the police was widely reported.

The woman, whose name has not been released, claimed that five men burst into the resort in Muang district where she was staying alone around 6:20 p.m. on July 4.

The men claimed to be members of a police task force in Kalasin. They searched his room but found nothing illegal. They found 20,000 baht in cash in the room. They then took her out of the room and asked her to point to white tissue paper left under a tree outside the room, but she refused, the woman said.

These men had wanted to record a video of her pointing at the tissue paper, as evidence.

She was then forcibly taken into their vehicle and they drove around Muang District. Along the way, they had tried to persuade her to confess that she owned the tissue paper, which contained illicit drugs. She said she refused.

The five men demanded 50,000 baht in return for his release, the woman said.

She said she was afraid of being falsely accused of drug offences. She contacted her younger brother and borrowed 30,000 baht from him, which she then gave to the men with the 20,000 baht they had seized from her room.

She had managed to film what had happened when the police raided her room without them noticing.

Provincial Police Region 4 Chief Pol Lt Gen Yanyong Vejosot ordered Kalasin Police Chief Pol Gen Suwan Chiewnawinthawat to explain the incident after the video aired on TV news.

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