Two drug gangs busted

Two big drug hauls today in different parts of the country.

Firstly, police arrested six suspects including the alleged drug-trafficking gang leader Phusinthorn Jomtharak, along with over 68,000 methamphetamine pills in Chaiyaphum province.

24 year old Phusinthorn, a Nong Bua Dang district native, was nabbed yesterday (Tuesday) while visiting a drug inmate friend at Chaiyaphum Prison.

Police say that Phusinthorn reportedly left five of his relatives and friends with a narcotics-manufacturing group located in the United Wa State Army territory within Myanmar in order to obtain a batch of 100,000 methamphetamine pills worth 1 million baht for distribution in Thailand.

Once he got the 1 million baht cash, he repaid the narcotics manufacturers and got his “human pawns” released, police said. Police said Phusinthorn’s gang has previously done this at least twice.

Following Phusinthorn’s arrest, police also apprehended his accomplices, 24 year old Yuranant Khampad, 21 year old Montri Salilard, 31 year old Khomkrit Doungnin and two male teens (whose names were withheld), who collected drugs from him to distribute in Chaiyaphum and nearby north-eastern provinces.

Upon the arrest of Khomkrit and Yuranant at a Muang Chaiyaphum apartment room they shared, police also confiscated 975 methamphetamine pills. Officers also retrieved Phusinthorn’s 68,970 methamphetamine pills from a sugarcane plantation in Tambon Nang Daed of Nong Bua Dang.

Meanwhile, police confiscated 20 kilograms of marijuana beside the Mekong in Nong Khai’s Phon Pisai district this morning (Wednesday).

Nong Khai deputy police chief Colonel Dechpol Premsiri told a press conference at the Phon Pisai police station that the marijuana, with a street value of about 100,000 baht, was left for a pick up at a riverside spot in Ban Thin Dung, Moo 10, in Tambon Wat Luang. Police, acting on a tip-off, conducted a stakeout but did not see anyone so they went to the spot at 6am and found the marijuana in a fertiliser sack.

Police suspect that a gang planned to transport it to Thai tourist destinations.

SOURCES: The Nation