Warrant Sought in Connection With Kirsty Jones Murder In Chiang Mai

From ANDREW DRUMMOND,
Bangkok, August 11 2011
BBC Wales

 
Thai police investigating the murder of Kirsty Jones will have to seek a warrant to forcefully carry out a DNA test on a Chiang Mai University professor after the academic refused to supply a sample voluntarily.

Police sources here confirmed yesterday that the request made by Dyfed-Powys Police in Britain had been rebuffed by the professor after he was approached by Thailand’s Department of Special investigating of the murder and rape of Kirsty, 24, in Chiang Mai in August 2000.

They stressed that this could not be in any way considered an admission of guilt. The sample was required to rule the professor out of the enquiry. The professor had strongly denied having anything to do with Kirsty. To secure DNA sample they would now have to go through legal channels.

It is understood the DSI are fearful they may be sued if they take any shortcuts, as the professor is a respected member of the community.

Nevertheless the refusal is another set -back for the investigation into the murder and rape of Kirsty Jones which happened 11 years ago this month in Chiang Mai in £3 a night lodgings then known as the Aree Guest House.

It is also distressing to Kirsty Jones’ family, from Tredomen, Brecon, who were hoping the matter would be dealt with quickly.

Police in Chiang Mai, the Thai northern capital, were heavily criticised at the time for their bungling of the case.  At the time they did not appear to be so concerned about short cuts. They arrested the British guest house owner Andrew Gill, 32, but released him after his DNA did not match the killer’s, who must have been of Asian extraction.

A tourist guide from the Karen hill-tribe, whose tour Kirsty had joined, announced at a police press conference that he was kidnapped by plain-clothed police, taken to a house, and beaten in an attempt to get a confession. 
 Narong Pojanathanrongpong (right) said police even tried to masturbate him,to obtain a sperm sample which he feared they might introduce to the crime scene.
They were unsuccessful and took him out and dumped him by the side of a road out of town, he claimed.
The Chiang Mai Guides Association turned up at Chiang Mai Provincial Police headquarters in force to protest.

The Chiang Mai University professor has been named as a suspect by an elderly Australian national, who said he had to flee Thailand after confronting the professor.

It is alleged that the professor was seen with a Thai tourist policeman hanging around outside the Aree Guest House shortly before she was murdered.

The tourist policeman was a friend of the Australian, who claimed that the professor came to visit him after he told the policeman that he was a suspect together with another person.  The professor invited him to a party but he was scared to go. The professor was angry at his refusal and assaulted him, he said.

The policeman in question was later filmed by a British production crew for the series ‘Big Trouble in Tourist Thailand’ broadcast on Sky and the Bravo Channel.
He never made the programme in question as the producers felt his behaviour was not in line with the positive image that they wished to present of Thai police. His DNA has been checked and does not match that of the killer.

Media gather outside the Chiang Mai Guide Association after the arrest of Narong