Thai police defend actions after rape claim
THAI POLICE are investigating a rape allegation made by a British tourist who claims that officers refused to file charges on her behalf when she initially reported the crime.
Police Colonel Krissana Pattanacharoen, deputy police spokesman, said an independent committee was established on Sunday to investigate claims that police on a Thai resort island had failed to file charges when the tourist reported she had been raped.
He said the committee would take seven days to come to a con- clusion. According to a report, an unidentified 19-year-old British national claimed that she was drugged, robbed and raped on the island of Koh Tao on June 26.
The report claimed that Thai police “were happy to make a report of the robbery but refused to take any details of the rape” when the teenager told police on a nearby island what had happened.
Thai officials claim that she never included allegations of rape in her initial report.
“They (police) have already said before that the person filing the charges did not include this (rape) charge,” Defence Minister Prawit Wongsuwan said.
“They only reported that they lost their belongings, so what can we do?
“Police have already talked about it. She didn’t file charges saying she was assaulted or raped or anything.”
Mr Prawit also denied speculation that there were influential people behind the alleged police cover-up. He said “influential people have all been arrested already”.
A number of unexplained tourist deaths have taken place in recent years on Koh Tao.
The most notorious case of late was of the murders of British nationals Hannah Witheridge and Leeds student David Miller, who were beaten to death in 2014. That case has been plagued with speculation the arrested suspects were scapegoats.
Recently the parents of Christina Annesley, a 23-year-old Leeds University history graduate who died on a gap year in Thailand three years ago, said they fear they will never know what happened to their daughter.
In January 2015, she was found dead in her bungalow on Koh Tao island, one of the country’s smaller tourist destinations.
Margaret and Boyne Annesley, from Orpington, London, believe her death is suspicious, claims the authorities deny.
It appears the investigation into Christina’s death was botched, with her body left for days in the heat of a temple, making it impossible to obtain accurate toxicology reports.