Friom Andrew Drummond, Bangkok
July 20 2009
For Irish Daily Mail
Link www.kingpower.com
Irish Mail n Sunday
The owners of the Duty Free concession at Bangkok airport have uploaded video which they claim shows an Irish scientist presenting just one of two items she had taken from shelves, before she fled Thailand on shoplifting charges.
And the company says it was right to prosecute Dr. Ashie Norris, 41, because although she claimed she had paid for two Bobbi Brown cosmetic items she only had a receipt for one.
The video presented by King Power on their website at the weekend, however shows only blurry images of a woman at a distant counter. It does appear there was only one item on the counter but the video made available is so distorted it is not possible to be sure either way.
Dr. Ashie Norris insists the video does not show whether she brought one or two items to the till.
King Power insists that when their security staff stopped Dr. Norris. “She removed her personal plastic bag from her luggage. This contained two pieces of Bobbi Brown cosmetics’
However, if the ‘personal plastic bag’ referred to is King Power’s plastic bag which it gives to all shoppers with the company logo, then by their own admission King Power staff packed and closed this bag themselves.
Dr. Norris fled Bangkok on July 4th with her husband Dr. Ronan Loftus, 42, after she was arrested, detained overnight, and then bailed on a shoplifting charge in a case which could have taken a year to get to court had she pleaded not guilty.
At the time Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport was involved in a scandal involving the shaking down of foreigners caught shoplifting for thousands of Euros. King Power have denied any involvement saying they cannot control what happens to cases after they are passed on to Thai police.
In Bangkok it has been nicknamed the airport ‘ Monopoly scam’ not so much because of the high amounts of money involved but the fact that victims or perpetrators could buy ‘Get out of jail’ cards to escape airport shoplifting charges. These ‘cards’ were letters issued by the local prosecutor and police.
Dr. Norris, from Churchtown, Dublin, claims she took both items to the counter and paid by credit card. It was not until she looked closely at her receipt after her arrest that she realised she had only be charged for one item. The item she paid for was a Bobbi Brown Lip tint. The item for which she had not been charged was a Bobbi Brown eyeliner gel worth 18.87 Euros.
“I just remember signing my credit card slip. I did not notice the total.” She was arrested after she left the shop.
“They were shouting at me. ‘You! You! You go jail six months!’ I did not know what they were talking about. They took the eyeliner off me and started waving it in my face. I said I had paid for it, but when I looked at the receipt it was only a receipt for 576 baht (12 Euros) for the Bobby Brown lipstick.”
“They took me to the airport police station and then to a police station outside the airport. It was terrifying. The cell was filthy and stank and was full of mosquitoes. I paced the cell all night. I did not want to sit or lie down.”
King Power have not been shy to place other videos on the internet of alleged shoplifters, including one of a British couple who said they had to pay the equivalent of £8000 to a Sri Lankan fixer who was working with the police and local courts. Its not known how many people have paid off but the Sri Lankan has admitted to dealing with over 100 cases.
Stephen Ingram and Xi Lin denied stealing a Givenchy wallet in April this year and said this week from that they planned to return to Bangkok to fight in the courts to get their money back.
They say they will contest the video which appears to show Xi Lin placing the wallet in her shoulder bag while Stephen Ingram looked on.
“The threat was that unless we paid the cash we would be in jail a very long time just waiting for the case to come up. It was basic extortion” said Mr. Ingram.
King power’s managing director Sombat Dechakanichpul said in a statement that Dr. Norris entered the shop in question on the evening of June 25 “After some time she proceeded to the cashier counter and presented one Bobbi Brown Lip tint for payment and left the shop.
“Meanwhile our sales staff had noticed that one Bobbi Brown eye-liner gel was missing from the display shelf where Ms. Norris had been.
“The security staff then proceeded to review the CCTV….Ms Norris was clearly visible on camera testing various products and then proceeding to offer one item to the cashier for payment.”
Dr. Norris, a scientist working for Marine Harvest of Letterkenny, but originally from Greenshill, Kilkenny, has not talked about her arrest since returning to Dublin.
Prior to fleeing Thailand she and her husband, Ronan, 43, a director of the Dublin company IdentiGen, who flew from Dublin with their one year old son Aran, to be at her side, said they had received consular advice and spoken directly with the Irish Ambassador to Malaysia Eugene Hutchinson.
Although the British Embassy has placed an advisory on their websites warning of ‘high fines’ for shoplifting and unclear areas of demarcation in airport shops, the Irish DFA has not.
The DFA merely warns of what could happen to people if they import more than their quota of cigarettes and drink.
“A number of tourists have been detained and fined for attempting to bring cigarettes into the country and have reported that they were very distressed by their experiences.”
“With the amount of publicity these events are getting , I would have expected to see a lot more stories of people claiming they had been unfairly accused of shoplifting by KP.
Even this latest case emerging about the Danish woman has yet to make me believe this is any more than people paying to avoid the Thai Justice system”.
Smee: post edited to include an edit in the main story. Ashie Norris has been in touch to state categorically
“The footage does not show whether I presented one or two very small items to the till and I never made any claim otherwise about not giving the girl both items’
She insists she brought both items to the check out and I can confirm that she said that when I interviewed her in Bangkok.
Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt, smeee.
Could this be a good time to get an interview with the colonel in charge of Samut Prakan police station? A couple of quotes perhaps with a comment or two from King Power and a snippet from the PM’s office apropos the Danish warning that his coppers are all bent? And then finishing off with the British Embassy’s response to King Power’s request that they should tell the brits back in Blighty that their folk are tea leaves and the Thai are all really nice misunderstood people at heart?
Might make a column in the Nation and recycling at Thaivisa.
Westerby: Well perhaps but rather unneccessary. I know what the policeman said to the BBC and I can see the policeman’s unlikely version in the Bangkok Post.
Quite clearly King Power and the Thai Police have not been able to get their story together.
The Bangkok Post failed to mention despite the repeated claims of the British couples guilt, that the couple have documents from the prosecutor and Rajathawi police saying they are innocent!
Most Thais understand what goes on in police stations here. The BP is merely window dressing.
You always have to read between the lines with the Thai Press.
In short the present government is out of sorts with a lot of things happening at the airport.
Kingpower were probably wise not to dwell on the other videos they have put up on their site.
The statement by the chief of police at Rajathewi says he has explained everything to the British Embassy. That implies that the British Embassy accepted his explanation.
As the Embassy amended its travel advisory to issue a warning about ‘high fines’ at Suvanrnabhumi I think it we can take it that the police chief was hamming up a little. Plus ca change
or does the document say that charges have been withdrawn after it was concluded that there was insufficient evidence to pursue the case ?
Faye Roule and his cryptic witticism ? perhaps he could elaborate ?
Smee: The first document is from the Ass. Prosecutor at Samut Prakarn Court to police at Rajathewa. This document says the case has been dismissed as the evidence and witnesses are insufficient.
The second document is from Rajathewa Police to the Immigration department saying the couple are free to leave Thailand as they have been found not to have committed an offence.
The s**t really hit the fan when the BBC picked up the airport extortion story. Thai authorities and King Power are in damage control mode, predictably blaming foreigners for “tarnishing Thailand’s image”.
If they cared less about their image and more about what happens on the ground Thailand’s tourist industry might not suffer as much.
I fear Thailand is in a decline which is hard to reverse. As the economy, foreign investment and tourism are down, shady locals have turned to increasingly heavy-handed methods to make money from what remains. This gives Thailand a bad reputation, which leads to fewer foreigners coming, which leads to even more desperate trickery from said shady locals, and so on.
I think if you watch the breaking news the thai government have now acted on this.
The high-ups have lost face so there will be a big show at the airport, with special police and TV cameras all over the place on the 28th of July. But then after a while will it will slip back to the usual corrupt practice? That would be the Thai way.
King Power claims that they are regularly victims of shoplifting so they installed cameras and trained staff in order to prevent loss. Each foreigner that has been accused of theft was in fact stealing from them and they can offer supporting evidence. However, they claim they have no knowledge of what happens to the accused after the police become involved. Last week I sawn some Israeli tourists trying to get away from paying an ice cream bill in Swensens so it would be ignorant to claim all foreigners are innocent and all Thais corrupt.
I tend to avoid Israeli tourists. I gather if you have to fight to get on a bus in Tel Aviv you will understand why!
KP have every right to protect their property. Having been informed that their customers/arrestees were being shaken down later however they might have realised how this might affect their own image, if they continued to tolerate it by their inaction.
How did the Irish woman leave Thailand?
Was her passport held by the police while she was on bail?
Or did she have her own passport?
If she was issued an emergency passport she would have had problems with no landing card upon leaving the country?
Cheers.
Indeed Al. Actually I cannot go down this road. However as she went to Immigration Bureau in Suan Phlu on the day she left my guess, and she has not said this, is that she had a new entrance stamp put on a new passport under a new name, because she could no longer account for her old passport. Just a guess mind you.
New name? Well she arrived under her maiden name which she still uses. But is also entitled to a passport under her married name.
Interesting.
From earlier reports we know that Dr. Norris and her husband had direct contact with the Irish Ambassador in Malaysia and with the Irish Consulate in Bangkok. I know that in Ireland a woman seeking a passport in her married name must surrender her passport in her maiden name for cancellation. Therefore it is unlikely she had 2 passports. This would suggest that the Irish embassy or consulate issued a passport to her in the full knowledge of the situation and the possible repercussions with Thai authorities. A step neither they nor the Irish Dept. Of Foreign Affairs would take lightly. If they were prepared to go that far they may even have issued a diplomatic passport as a way around having no landing card. I suspect there is more to this issue than has been made puplic and I presume you, Andrew know more than you can say. Being Irish I can be quick to criticise my government,however,in this case I say kudos to them for taking such positive and quick action on behalf of one of their nationals.
Travel advise on Irish Dept. Of Foreign Affairs website;
“Visitors passing through Suvarnabhumi Airport, or moving between shops and stalls, should be extremely careful to ensure that they have paid, and have receipts for, all items in their possession before they move away from the vendor. We have received reports that innocent shoppers have been the subject of allegations of suspected theft and threatened that their cases will not be heard for several months unless they plead guilty and pay substantial fines. Understandably, this causes great distress to visitors engaged in normal tourist shopping activities.”
I’ve just noticed that the above travel advisory has been added to the Irish Dept. of Foreign Affairs website. Note the explicit use of the words “innocent shoppers”. The plot thickens and the pressure on Thailand mounts.
Sorry for making so many posts but it just struck me that the following quote from the DFA’s advisory along with the explcit use of the words “innocent shoppers” clearly implies that the Irish Government believes that items are being added to shoppers goods at check-out so that they can later be accused of shoplifting. Wow, strong words and word’s I would suggest no government would use lightly.
“Visitors passing through Suvarnabhumi Airport, or moving between shops and stalls, should be extremely careful to ensure that they have paid, and have receipts for, all items in their possession before they move away from the vendor.”
Thanks for keeping me up to speed. I missed the DFA amendment
I understand this lady is a scientist and was attending a conference in Thailand. One has to ask it is likely she would shoplift an eyeliner for 19 euro approx.
IMO she was set up to be scammed.
It certainly looks like it.
It may have been qiuetly sorted now under an agreement not to make more comment. The english also have gagging orders of course as do all countries.