Monthly Archive for November, 2007

It all went tits up! Nov. 20 2007

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on November 20, 2007
in General News
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Pensioner drugged and robbed by women in Thailand

By Andrew Drummond in Bangkok

Tuesday November 20 2007
A retired Irish businessman living in Thailand has had his savings stolen by two women who drugged and robbed him.
Jerry McCarthy (66), from Co Louth, woke up with a headache after befriending two women in a bar.

He signed a statement with Thai police saying he had taken them back to his home in Pattaya, which is 100 miles east of Bangkok.

This police statement suggested he may be the latest victim of two local women who smear themselves with a powerful drug.

But last night Mr McCarthy denied this, releasing a statement saying: “I refute it (the police statement) absolutely as it does not at all reflect what occurred that night.”mccarthyj01

Mr McCarthy, from Dundalk Street, Carlingford, a separated father of two, and a former manager of a plastics company, said: “The robbery arose after the non-alcoholic drink I was drinking in a bar was spiked with an illegal substance.

“Following the robbery I was interviewed by the police while still recovering from the illegal substances which was administered to me. A statement was presented to me to sign in Thai and not in English.”

He lost €3,200, his laptop computer, and two mobile phones when he collapsed after he brought the women back to his home.

Police in Pattaya said that the chances of making an arrest were slim.

Police Colonel Kongrit Thamasatien said: “He also lost his passport and his credit cards. The cash was in his safe. The two women managed to escape with the entire safe and its contents. We believe a number of foreign tourists have been drugged recently by the same two women.”

Last night Mr McCarthy said he wanted to clarify some issues with Thai police.

“I have contacted the Thai police with a view to amending my statement to reflect what actually happened and to clear my name.”

Mr McCarthy, described by people in Carlingford as a “quiet man, who kept to himself”, is a former captain of Greenore golf club.

* Pattaya police said that McCarthy stated that he had driven into the city from his home on Pratamnak Hill, picked up two girls in Soi 12 and stopped at a 7/11 to buy drinks on the way home. It was at his home after playing with the girls, in a way which is now disputed, that he became ill and blacked out.

In a sensational case in 1995 three Austrian steelworkers slept through Christmas at the Thai Garden Resort in North Pattaya after being administered with an ‘Upjohn’ drug by girls who had apparently smeared their nipples.Upjohn07

Photos and videos of two of them snoring well into the police investigation were beamed around the world, and to their wives back home, long before their return.

- Andrew Drummond in Bangkok

Irish Independent story

WARNING FROM THE PATTAYA CITY NEWS, edited by Howard Miller

“A much publicized new form of drugging was apparently used by the two women which we will explain in full, for the benefit of others who may get caught out by the same trick. The women had placed medication on their breasts and encouraged the victim to lick this particular area. He failed to realize that he was ingesting a flavorless chemical which causes you to lose consciousness.

Headline from the London SUN:   ‘It all went tits up!”

Welcome to the world of Thai journalism - This is London

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on November 8, 2007
in General News
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Welcome to the world of Thai journalism
By Andrew Drummond 21.11.01
 
They met, over a meal of catfish and whisky, on a smart riverboat restaurant. Within a few minutes, the deck was soaked in blood and three of them were dead. The bloodbath - the result of a difference of opinion between reporters from rival newspapers - may have curled a few hairs in the West.

But here, where journalists often pack Uzis and Magnums, the news was greeted with little more than a few raised eyebrows. I would certainly think twice before accepting a dinner invitation with some of my Thai counterparts.

For the press in this country is like no other. The tabloids, perhaps the least restricted in the world, are forever breaking new boundaries on easy showbiz targets. When, for example, a film star was being blackmailed, the mass tabloid Thai Rath published the blackmailers’ nude pictures of her.

Yet where politicians and other influential figures are concerned, the rules are rather different. Here, journalists are not necessarily picked for their writing skills but for the influence they wield. Many have their own rackets, nightclubs, bars and restaurants. There is a local expression: “Truth will never die, but if you tell it, you will die for sure.” In one record year, 19 journalists were slain in a variety of incidents; this was not necessarily because of their fearless search for the truth but because of conflicting business interests.

I once ran a campaign to close down a camp of long-necked tribal Padaung who had been put on display in a “human zoo” for tourists in the same province. The families, including 21 children, had been kidnapped from Burma. The head of the kidnap gang hired a national newspaper journalist to write that I was a “foreign spy” and that the child welfare officer who was helping me was a “riddled old hag who wanted to start her own rival camp”.

We won. The camp was closed but we had to take it to the government in Bangkok who warned the local mayor and local police, all of whom were in the gang leaders’ pocket, to back off.

Foreigners are now sending me letters from jail claiming they have had to pay small fortunes to journalists in order for their misdemeanours to be kept out of the local paper. They have also been presented with a price list for bail and a full acquittal.

Last year, a British millionaire was arrested in Pattaya, after apparently being found in possession of 100 amphetamines found in a packet of cigarettes. I called for a copy of a video of the Thai police press conference, which showed two policemen speaking in Thai about how rich they had become as a result of the arrest.

Not one local journalist picked up on the injustice, yet they must have known what was going on. The Briton was sent to jail. A few days later, along came a Pattaya journalist who offered him a deal: hand over £25,000, and the reporter would sort out an acquittal.
 

Long-necked women kidnapped again for Thailand’s human zoos

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on November 7, 2007
in General News and The Times
. 0 Comments

From Andrew Drummond, Bangkok, November 7th

Long-necked women kidnapped for Thailand’s lucrative ‘human zoos

Padaung01 Tourist gives sweets to Padaung 1 2 3 4

Long-necked women kidnapped for Thailand’s lucrative ‘human zoos

From Andrew Drummond, Bangkok, November 7th

Police in Thailand are investigating new allegations that unscrupulous tour operators have kidnapped Burmese long-necked women for use in lucrative tourist camps known as ‘human zoos’.

Six members of the Padaung Burmese hill tribe have been reported missing from refugee camps in the Northern Thai district of Mae Hong Son, 400 miles north of Bangkok and police have set up an investigation team to try and find them.

Police Major Worapot Phuttawong said: “We believe that the only purpose for their kidnapping is for exhibition in these tourist camps over the peak holiday season which is beginning now and will continue over Christmas.”

The missing persons report was lodged by a Padaung man called Yathaue, aged 43, who says his wife Masae, aged 34, and eight year old daughter and six year old son disappeared after she went to pick the children up from school in Huai Pukaeng, near Mae Hong Son.

When he went looking for them in another long-necked community in Baan Huai Seu Theo, villagers there complained that a 21-yr-old long necked woman, Mali, had been kidnapped along with a 10-yr-old boy Layeu and an 11-yr-old girl called Keuboma.

The kidnapping of Burmese long necked woman from Burma for tourist camps in Thailand was first exposed by ‘The Times’ ten years ago.

A Thai businessmen was arrested and charged with detaining people against their will.  The Governor of the Tourism Authority of Thailand said at the time that ‘human zoos run by unscrupulous businessmen’ were harming the county’s reputation.

The businessmen was, however, later acquitted in a local court, as indeed he had boasted he would be, and since then numerous ‘long-necked camps’ have been started in the province of Chiang Mai.

Legally the only place the long-necked tribe can reside is in the refugee camps in Mae Hong Son on the Thai-Burma border, but Thai authorites have turned a blind eye and issued permits for the long necked women to be employed as ‘farm labourers’ elsewhere.

They do no farming. The children do not have access to schools and are required to sit in their huts with their mothers all day and weave or dance for busloads of tourists.
 Sudarat Sereewat, Secretary of The Fight against Child Exploitation (FACE) who organised the previous rescue of nine adults and 21 children from a ‘human zoo’ in Thaton, Northern Thailand said: “If these children have indeed been kidnapped for a human zoos the authorities should come down on the culprits in the strongest way possible. It is quite shameful.  I hope no authorites are involved in covering anything up.”

*Prisoners in a Human Zoo
 

Drugs kingpin seized at Thai mansion while packing pills for Halloween - Daily Mail

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on November 1, 2007
in General News
. 0 Comments

From Andrew Drummond, Bangkok, November 2 2007

Briton who ran a world-wide drugs syndicate from his mansion home in Thailand was arrested last night as he was packing drugs for a ‘high society’ Halloween party.

Marcus James, 48, from Lewisham, South London, was seized along with his common-law Thai wife Linrat Chalwatworachot, 36, at his £1 million mansion in the resort of Pattaya, 100 miles east of Bangkok.

Police seized drugs, drug making equipment, and all his assets worth in excess of £10 million. It included stashes of gold and cash.

Marcus James01

Marcus James was seized at his £1million mansion in the resort of Pattaya

Using sniffer dogs Thai police found Ecstasy and met-amphetamines hidden in upstairs and downstairs toilets, in an office desk and a safe. They also found the materials for making ‘Ice’.

Police Lieutenant Colonel Adisorn Nongsee said James admitted all as he had been caught red handed.

“He was packing drugs for a Halloween party.

“His cover was that he was running a travel company, but his real business was drugs.

marcusjames02

Marcus James looks on at what the Thai police uncovered

“He admitted to our investigators that he was making the drugs and sending them to England and Europe where they were used at ‘high society’ parties. He was also supplying high society parties in Bangkok and Pattaya.

“He had become rich from his business and been able to buy several cars and a 1903 Harley Davison motorcycle.”

Police said that although his house in Jomtien Palace Village contained most of the equipment for making drugs they believed the actually factory was elsewhere and they were still looking for it and other members of the gang.

They have yet to weight all the drugs and formal charges will be made later, but they so far had counted over 6000 Ecstasy and met-amphetamine tablets.

Marcus James faces the death sentence in Thailand, but all death sentences given to westerners have been reduced to life imprisonment.

Daily Mail