Surge of reported harassments by police in Thailand

[huahin4ever]

Not good if this is true!

Surge of reported harassment suggests police targeting tourists, expats

In recent weeks a pattern of reported incidents of harassment, random daytime searches, detention and intimidation suggest an organized campaign by police is targeting tourists and foreign nationals.
Although it’s difficult to verify or substantiate many of the claims, the sheer number that have been raised in correspondence, online forums, blogs and news reports would indicate a higher than normal level of such incidents.
“It seems like its getting worse and worse, a lot of friends are getting stopped and harassed, particularly around Thong Lor,” said a foreign national living legally in Bangkok, who requested anonymity for fear of further harassment.
A private Facebook group created this past weekend to share such stories has already gained more than 200 members, some of whom told of systematically being stopped, searched, threatened with arrest and sometimes asked for money.

An expat resident living in the Phra Khanong area said he was walking home from 7-Eleven at 6pm early last month when he was ordered to stop by a man wearing civilian clothes. Concerned that it was a scam, he kept walking. At that point the man grabbed his arm and pulled his badge out.
“Then this English guy crosses the road and says ‘You’ve been acting suspicious ... I want to see your passport,'” he recounted.
They refused a photocopy of his passport and phone image of his visa. “He kept saying ‘I’m here to help you,’ but he seemed there to help shake me down. They wouldn’t let me go.” They put him in an unmarked pickup truck with the windows blacked out, and he was relieved when they actually took him to a nearby police station.
“They wanted to urine test, they wanted me to sign a document,” he said. “I refused.” When he told them his lawyer was coming to the station, “they lost interest” and eventually fined him THB100 for not carrying his passport and released him.

Many reports have been in the Thong Lor area. An expat resident living in the area claimed that on Monday police forced him to the Thong Lor Police Station for a urine test. When he couldn’t produce, he says they forced him to drink four liters of water and pressed forcefully on his bladder to make him urinate and touched his penis.

Another foreigner says he was taken to a police station where someone said they wanted to see his phone, and then proceeded to search through his messages and emails while refusing to return it.

Another man reportedly came downstairs from his building to refill water jugs from a filtration machine. He was detained and said the police wouldn’t let him go back upstairs to fetch his passport.

Again these reports cannot be verified, but they’re numerous and bear many similarities. The details and locations vary, but they almost all involve men stopped during the daytime while alone and compelled to take urine tests.

In a letter to the editor published in the Bangkok Post, Reese Walker described her “Thai holiday nightmare.” Walker wrote that soon after arriving in Bangkok, she was riding in a taxi with her fiance when they were stopped by police and ordered out of the cab. Without comment, police subjected to “a frightening and humiliating search at the side of the road.” They were eventually allowed to leave. The next night they were walking near Asoke intersection the same thing happened, with police laughing at them and ordering her fiance to take a urine test. “This is our first and last visit to Thailand. The atmosphere is intimidating and oppressing.”

An article posted Friday to an Asian travel blog describes the “rapidly increasing policy of harassing Western visitors and residents in Bangkok.”
“... such individuals are now regularly being stopped by Bangkok police, where they are interrogated, searched, and made to contribute urine samples. This policy has become infamous in the tourist areas controlled by the Thong Lor and Lupini district police. Westerners are routinely stopped at random on the street, in taxicabs, and when traveling on motorcycle taxis. The stops are held day and night. When stopped, the individual is asked for identification, to empty the contents of pockets and purses for inspection, and a urine sample may be demanded as well, to be given and analyzed on the spot. Those not having proper identification or papers may be taken to a nearby police station, where they are held temporarily until the issue is either resolved or remanded to the Thai court system.”

In another unverifiable account, someone claimed online the 71- and 72-year
old parents of “a friend” were recently detained and ordered to take a urine test while coming out of the Terminal 21 shopping mall.
Non-white foreigners including Japanese expats have also reported being stopped by police.
An investigator at one of the police stations reportedly involved said he was unaware of any “crackdown” or arrests of foreigners.

"It could have been drugs-related charges, but those arrests are of colored people,” said investigator Chaliew of the Khlong Tan police department, who refused to give his last name. “Mostly drugs and illegal immigration charges. … There haven't been many arrests of white people ... like Americans."
Although Thailand is operating under the emergency provisions of Martial Law, that only applies to the Army and its soldiers – not the police force.
According to Section 93 of the criminal code, searches conducted in public are prohibited without probable cause. The code states searches are only allowed by police officers when there is probably cause to suspect someone has something in their possession that is illegal, will be used to commit a crime or was obtained through commission of a crime.

Of course there’s a subjectivity to “probable cause” that’s going to lean toward the officer’s interpretation.
Chokwan Chopaka of Thai Legal Firm said although random searches are nothing new, their office has had a surge of inquiries from people who’ve experienced such incidents, which seem to be happening during the daytime and mostly targeting men.
She advised anyone stopped to use common sense and be aware they do have some rights.
“If they’re going to search, first have them show their hands to make sure they’re empty,” she said.
Women have a right to request a woman police officer to conduct the search, which probably means going to the station. If they demand a urine test, you can refuse to do it on the street and insist they conduct it at the station or in a clinic.
Also carrying adequate documentation is advisable.
“Foreigners should at least carry a photocopy of their passport. Not just the front page, but also the visa page,” she said, adding that photos on your smartphone are likely to be rejected.
In case police detain you or take you into the station, insist on calling your attorney – even if you don’t have one. You can also insist they contact your embassy.
“Don’t sign anything and tell them you want to call your lawyer,” she said. “At a minimum, call a friend and get them involved – preferably Thai.”
And no matter how righteously wronged one may feel, there’s nothing to be gained by showing anger. Stay polite and don’t raise your voice.


Link to the post:
http://bangkok.coconuts.co/2014/12/04/s ... sts-expats

[brianks]

The Stickman has been reporting this for many weeks now as he has gotten a lot of emails from readers subjected to these searches.

[usual suspect]

I saw on the TV that a Thai news station had picked up on the story & had video footage in their report showing a harrassment scene..
..just maybe, maybe this now might get back to someone higher up in the RTP or others with influence
..??

[richard]

Under martial law the police are now second fiddle and are losing vast amounts of tea money. Need I say more?

[NOKYAI]

I haven't noticed the tea money road blocks on Mondays and Fridays recently?

[richard]

I haven't noticed the tea money road blocks on Mondays and Fridays recently?

True

The twice weekly condo chain mid-day routine pa-lava has ceased too. Maybe they no longer like the vendor food carts fare anymore

Back to the BK harassment. It is reported in several other forums of the drug scam shakedowns going on. As most of you know many young backpacking visitors openly take coke or weed at home and will more than likely still have traces in their systems when arriving here. How long will it be before some reasonably bright spark sets up a police roadblock at the airport exits?

[usual suspect]

Earlier this year when I was pulled over at a combined Army+Police checkpoint on Hwy 24 (Issan) While the MiB was checking my bags of rice in the back of my truck..a man from the Army was videoing his every move
..
Then when my wife asked about the camera, the Army-man told her it was evidence in case the MiB
put a packet of drugs in with my sacks before I closed the lid down

(Army video man said time & time again the MiB have another roadblock of their own 2-5km up the road..where they find their stash & bust you!)..

[JamesWest]

Earlier this year when I was pulled over at a combined Army+Police checkpoint on Hwy 24 (Issan) While the MiB was checking my bags of rice in the back of my truck..a man from the Army was videoing his every move
..
Then when my wife asked about the camera, the Army-man told her it was evidence in case the MiB
put a packet of drugs in with my sacks before I closed the lid down

(Army video man said time & time again the MiB have another roadblock of their own 2-5km up the road..where they find their stash & bust you!)..

sounds like the Army saved you from a Thai prison nightmare.

[usual suspect]

Possibly true J.W.
This was at the time there was a lot of mixed feelings in Thailand about the Army taking over the general running of things..I for one, on that day.. gave them the vote of confidence..

[buksida]

Bangkok Post letters page has been getting quite a bit of commentary on this also:

Heading for a police state
I have been reading with some concern about what appears to be the increasing occurrence of spot urine testing of mainly Western males in the Thong Lor and Asoke areas of Bangkok, but did not personally know anyone that had been subjected to this until this week.

A friend of mine arrived in Bangkok on Thursday to begin a two-week holiday that would have taken in Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Krabi. It was his first visit to the Kingdom. His hotel was in the Asoke area. On Friday, his second day here, he was heading back to his hotel mid-afternoon when he was accosted by police and subjected to the same intimidation and humiliation as other victims have reported.

When I met him on Friday evening he was clearly still shaken up, so much so that he decided to call off the rest of his holiday here and instead flew to Kuala Lumpur on Saturday morning to spend the rest of his vacation there and in Singapore. He described the incident as "frightening" and vowed never to return to Thailand again. He said he would advise anyone planning to come here, either for work or a holiday, to think again.

There is now even a Facebook page dedicated to sharing the experiences of many people who have been subjected to this. The Tourism Authority of Thailand can pay the biggest PR firms in the world to promote the country, but with people becoming increasingly aware that they can be harassed, shaken down and potentially imprisoned after coming here, no campaign, no matter how swish, will recover the country's image.

Long before the so-called Arab Spring I lived and worked in Syria for a year, which was then a de facto police state. There, like here, the police force was not regarded by the expat community (or the vast majority of locals) as an entity to serve and protect, but rather to be avoided at all costs. When I first arrived in Thailand eight years ago I never imagined I would be finding comparisons between the Kingdom's security apparatus and that of the Assad regime, but there you have it.
S Tracy

http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opin ... lice-state