Disabled lottery seller swindled out of one million baht

A lottery ticket seller with a disability filed a complaint with the police yesterday after a man, pretending to be the President of the Association of the Disabled Union of Thailand, lured her into investing one million baht in lottery tickets.

The Secretary of Punyaphat Foundation for Persons with Disabilities yesterday filed a complaint on behalf of the 36 year old Arintara at the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) in Bangkok.

The lottery ticket seller informed the police that she spoke with the suspect, Chewanon, via Facebook. Chewanon claimed that he was the president of the disabled association. Arintara was taken in by his claim because he had a picture of himself wearing a uniform, looking very much like a government official on Facebook.

Chewanon told Arintara that he could access a huge number of lottery tickets and that she didn’t have to wait for the quota from the government. He persuaded her to pay him the money and he would send the tickets to her.

Arintara invested about one million baht for 150 packs of letter tickets in March but she did not receive anything.

Chewanon did not give her any lottery tickets and urged Arintara to wait because he had a few personal problems. Chewanon then spun a story that his problems almost drove him to commit suicide.

Chewanon later confessed to Arintara that he used her money to pay off some debts but promised to pay the money back.

Arintara revealed there was no development after five months so she decided to file a complaint against him.

The CIB acknowledged the case adding they would submit Arintara’s evidence to senior officers to continue the investigation and prosecution.

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