15 year old stabs teen to death at Thai market

A 15 year old boy stabbed a 16 year old boy to death at Owl Night Market in Nonthaburi province, just north of Bangkok in central Thailand, on Tuesday. The teenagers apparently did not know each other.

The deceased’s 15 year old friend Tee (pseudonym) told police that he was at the market with his friends when another group of teenagers of a similar age started yelling and taunting them.

Tee said that one of the boys, 15 year old Somchai (pseudonym), pulled a knife out of his waist belt and started chasing him and his friends.

Everyone managed to escape apart from 16 year old Toto (pseudonym). Somchai stabbed Toto six times in the back, ribcage, left arm, and left shoulder in the middle of the market’s food court at 8.30pm. Somchai fled.

Injured Toto ran away before collapsing near the ATM at the exit of the market. Tee said he tried to take his injured friend to the hospital on his motorbike but vendors at the market advised him to wait for rescue workers to arrive.

Rescue workers came and took Toto to Phra Nang Klao Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

Police immediately arrested Somchai in the market car park and detained him for interrogation.

The teenage killer told a different tale. Somchai told police that he went to the market to meet friends when a group of teenagers started taunting him. Somchai said he walked around the market and bought a kitchen knife in case he needed to protect himself.

Somchai said he encountered the teenagers again and one boy, Toto, held up a knife and asked him, “So you think you’re a big man?” spurring Somchai to kill him.

However, 25 year old witness Nareerat, who works at the market, said that although she did not see the stabbing, she did see Toto, covered in stab wounds, running from out of the food court toward the exit of the market moments before he collapsed.

Nareerat said she did not see Toto carrying any weapons.

Police arrested Somchai under suspicion of, “bodily harm causing death and carrying knives in a town, village or public place without permission.”

Police didn’t say whether Somchai would be tried in a juvenile or adult court.

Knife crime is rampant in Thailand.