Red Bull case must rev up
After a long delay, justice is starting to take its course in the notorious hit-and-run case involving Vorayuth “Boss” Yoovidhya, the Red Bull scion who allegedly killed a policeman in the Thong Lor area of Sukhumvit in September 2012 before fleeing the country. The attorney-general on Tuesday indicted former national police chief Somyot Poompanmoung and seven others, including Nate Naksuk, a former deputy attorney general, for their attempts to whitewash the culprit, who remains at large.
Vorayuth has been spotted overseas by foreign journalists, but attempts to extradite him back to Thailand have all come to nought.
The Feb 27 indictment is based on a recommendation from the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC), which handled the case in line with the work of a probe panel under former graft buster Vicha Mahakun, who deserves all the credit.
The panel was set up by the former Prayut Chano-cha administration in 2020 in response to a public uproar over a decision by Mr Nate, the then-deputy attorney general, to drop charges against Vorayuth.
This was based on “new” evidence — and witnesses — that were later proven to be false, particularly that which purported to show Vorayuth had been driving considerably slower at the time of the incident, in the wee hours of Sept 3, than police had thought.
As a result, Mr Nate was among those initially implicated by the Vicha panel. He was dismissed from the Office of the Attorney-General (OAG) in 2022 for his role in the case but still receives his pension given his unblemished past performance.
More importantly, the Vicha panel found rampant abuse of power among the police and other agencies that enabled Vorayuth to escape justice.
According to the panel, several senior officials ordered their subordinates, particularly those doing work, to distort data to help the culprit evade the law.
If that’s not bad enough, it was reported there were blatant attempts by the Royal Thai Police to nullify the panel’s findings so those in the wrong would not be punished.
This time, the OAG is on the right track. Mr Nate and Pol Gen Somyot are among eight people facing charges of dereliction of duty, which is a criminal offence, in the saga.
Others facing the axe are Pol Maj Gen Thawatchai Mekprasertsuk, a former commander of the Royal Thai Police’s Central Police Forensic Science Division, and Pol Col Viradol Tabtimdee, a former investigator at Thong Lor police station, as well as an engineering lecturer who had a role in establishing Vorayuth’s new theory on the lower car speed.
The OAG spared Education Minister Permpoon Chidchob, then-deputy police chief, who was also found to have had a hand in the case. His fate is to be decided by the prime minister.
According to the OAG, prosecutors at the Crime Suppression Bureau will proceed with indicting the eight accused.
But the OAG and other state agencies must do more to prevent such serious blunders from happening. They should consider some flaws in the system pinpointed by the Vicha panel — especially the statute of limitations.
Such deadlines should arguably be suspended. The police should also revive their extradition efforts and seek help from Interpol, which would no doubt help to restore the sagging reputation of the RTP.