The body of a Chinese man, with arms and legs bound, stuffed into a suitcase, has washed up on a sandbank in the Ping River in northern Thailand’s Kamphaeng Phet province. The body was doubled over and the ankles were tied with plastic cable ties. Red rope encircled the arms and legs.

Police believe the man was 30 year old Jun Wang, who had arrived on February 12 with a group of fifteen other Chinese nationals who visited Pattaya. The remainder of the group left the country on February 14, but Jun stayed on.

Police are investigating the connections the man had with the group and his reported residence in Pattaya.

A one kilometre stretch of the river was searched for an hour for additional clues.

An autopsy is being carried out at a forensics center in a hospital in Phitsanulok province and the cause of death is expected to be announced soon.

SOURCES: The Pattaya News | Thai Rath

A murder suspect from Canada has lost his appeal against extradition to the United States after Bangkok’s Appeal Court upheld a lower court’s ruling, sending him to face a murder charge there. The ruling was handed down this afternoon. The extradition was sought by the Office of the Attorney-General against Matthew Alexander McGowan, accused of fatally shooting another person in September 2017 in the US state of Florida. He was arrested in Thailand in November 2018 and all bail requests have been denied. The US sought his extradition soon after his arrest but McGowan has refused to be extradited.

Accounts given by Florida police and prosecutors in Florida handling the case, as well as an image of the suspect captured in CCTV footage strongly support McGowan having been involved in the crime.

McGowan was brought to the Criminal Court yesterday from the Bangkok Remand Prison, where he has been held since his arrest in November 2018.

In June 2019, the Criminal Court ordered his extradition to the US. McGowan appealed the extradition, insisting he was not the person described in the extradition request. But a witness, a diplomat, testified before the court that the defendant was in fact the person in the arrest warrant issued by the US court. Immigration police say investigation shows the defendant is the person wanted by the US.

The Appeal Court upheld the lower court’s ruling to extradite McGowan to the US, on the grounds that he is the person on the arrest warrant and it is not a political case.

After hearing the verdict, McGowan asked the court whether he could appeal the ruling again, but the court said the ruling is final.

SOURCE: Bangok Post

A former Chiang Mai policeman, arrested for a burglary in his home district of Sanpatong, has escaped from custody. Police are now hunting for the the fugitive. The officer, identified only as “Pawaret,” was arrested over the weekend and held at a police station but had to be taken to the local hospital because he’d had suffered injuries after an attack by a furious mob at the scene of his latest burglary.

He was secured to his hospital bed by cuffs on his foot, but managed to escape in the early hours of the morning, get a lift on a motorcycle and flee. He was dressed in a long sleeved shirt and shorts, and had his beard shaved and his hair matted down for surgery.

Police are studying CCTV footage but believe he can’t have gone far.

Naew Na reported that Pawaret was formerly a police corporal but was drummed out of the service after embezzlement in a drugs case. He then turned to a life of crime and had warrants out against his name in three other cases, over and above his most recent burglary.

In the latest case, an item of gold jewelry was recovered. He was attacked by locals and arrested by Sanpatong police.

SOURCES: thaivisa| Naew Na