Chinese Pattaya nightclub owner nowhere in sight as cops seize token assets

A Pattaya Police attempt to dismantle the drug networks of a Chinese crime boss has failed to apprehend that star of the show. At least the police managed to get their hands on a few of the nightclub owner’s assets worth a paltry 50 million baht (US$1.5 million).

It’s not quite as exciting as it sounds. They didn’t take the nightclubs, just a couple of old houses in an unattractive estate.

Pol Maj Gen Chaipot Suwannarak said yesterday that officers had posted forfeiture notices outside two buildings in the Sirisa 16 housing estate in Pattaya. Both belong to Chinese national Yang Zhiguo, wanted for drug offences. How a Chinese national came to own property in Thailand nor quite what the police meant by “own” was not made clear.

Investigators claim that Yang used drug money to buy the houses and registered them as offices of real estate companies. Yang, however, did not operate any real estate business. Instead, he invested with colleagues in the Bone and Club One in Pattaya, catering to the unique tastes of Pattaya’s Chinese visitors.

Besides the two houses, police also seized two bank accounts holding more than 14 million baht (US$400,000), five mobile phones, one computer and some untaxed foreign liquor. The total value was estimated at 50 million baht.

To make an already gripping narrative more enthralling yet, Yang was nowhere to be found, perhaps due to the Thai police habit of informing the bad guys seven days in advance before making seizures.