After murdering a Taiwanese man and dumping his heavily tattooed body near Suvarnabhumi airport, a gang of four Taiwanese men and one Thai woman visited a casino in Poipet before leaving for Phnom Penh, according to police.
Detectives in Samut Prakan asked immigration police in Sa Kaeo on Sunday evening to keep watch for members of the gang suspected of murdering Taiwanese national Shih Mou Chiang, 44.
His tattooed body was found in a deserted food stall near the airport on Sunday.
Pol Col Napatpong Supaporn, immigration chief in Sa Kaeo province, said on Monday that securiy camera recordings showed the gang members arriving in Sa Kaeo in a van about 4pm on Sunday.
The five suspects showed their passports to immigration officers at the Aranyaprathet checkpoint and crossed the border to Poipet in Cambodia about 6pm on Sunday. Immigration police could not stop them because at fhe time there was no warrant out for their arrest, he said.
Sa Kaeo detectives found out that the suspects visited a casino in Poipet about 7.30pm and about 9pm they hired a taxi and headed for Phnom Penh. Investigators were awaiting information from Cambodian authorities on whether the gang had left Cambodia.
Police sources said the Taiwanese victim was shot repeatedly in the head at a house owned by a Thai who now lives in Taiwan. The house is in Lat Plakhao area of Lat Phrao district in Bangkok and was rented to a Thai woman.
Witnesses said a Thai woman in her 20s lived there. It was thought she might be a girlfriend of the murdered man. Young people of Thai and Chinese appearance regularly partied at the house, and they arrived and left in luxury cars.
The victim, Shih, had allegedly fled Taiwan to avoid arrest for robbery and illegal possession of a firearm.
On Saturday he allegedly stole a white Toyota Yaris car in Pattaya. It was found abandoned on Ratchadaphisek Road in Bangkok about 12.10am on Sunday.
The murdered man arrived at the rented house in Lat Plakhao on a motorcycle about 2am. Three of the four Taiwanese suspects arrived in Thailand about the same time. The suspects were 25-42 years old.
At 3.12am on Sunday the suspects arrived at the rented house in a taxi. Shortly afterwards, neighbours heard gunshots. At 4.51am a red Mazda car was seen leaving the housing estate.
At 7.30am on Sunday the car reached Bang Phli district of Samut Prakan. It entered an alley near a waste disposal facility for Suvarnabhumi airport. Police believed the car was used to carry the victim’s body, which was then dumped in a deserted food stall near the airport.
The red Mazda was later found abandoned not far away. Inside it, police found 500 grammes of ketamine, cleaning fluid, a blood-stained cloth and an empty pistol box.
The police investigation is continuing.
PHOTO Forensic police examine the deserted food stall where the tattooed body of a Taiwanese man was found, near Suvarnabhumi airport in Samut Prakan province on Sunday. (Photo: Sutthiwit Chayutworakan)Bangkok post
