A heavily pregnant 20 year old Tai Yai woman and her 19 year old boyfriend reported a disturbing incident of robbery which occurred in Saraphi this week.
According to the victim, who wishes not to be named, a woman knocked on her apartment door just before mid-day on the 24th May. She said that she was lying in bed resting and playing on her phone when she felt that it was hot and so she opened her room door. Not long after, a woman walked by and started chatting to her from the doorway, eventually entering the room, even though she wasn’t invited. The victim said that when the conversation turned to fabric softener she immediately told the woman that she wasn’t interested and that she didn’t have any money. The woman kept begging her to buy the fabric softener, telling her it was only one baht per pack. Feeling sorry for her, she agreed to buy five packs. The woman agreed to give her an extra packet and when the victim handed over 20 baht, expecting 15 baht in change, the woman said she had no change. Suddenly the victim saw that at the back of each package was the price of 1,000 baht. She then told the woman that she didn’t want the product anymore, but the woman said it was too late and that she had to pay up in full.
Soon another woman walked into the room with an electric wok and gas stove, telling the victim that she had requested them and had to now pay for them too. The woman, feeling pressured, said she would buy one item, and attempted to call her boyfriend to transfer the money. The two women wouldn’t allow her to call her boyfriend, instead seeing her piggy bank which had a padlock on it and insisted that she open it.
The victim refused to open it, saying it was for her soon to be newborn baby, and this was when a third woman walked into the room with a hammer.
The victim said that at that point she hugged her piggy bank close to her chest, and feeling pressured opened it up, taking 2,000 baht to give to the women, hoping that they would go away.
The women then made a call to a man, who was supposedly waiting downstairs in a car, telling him not to come upstairs just yet. The victim, fearing for her life at this point, then handed all her savings from the piggy bank – 4,000 baht – to the group, who then exited her room and left the building. The victim said that she was too shocked to respond and take down the license plate.
She said that she was in so much shock and fear throughout the ordeal that she didn’t think to call for help. It was only when her boyfriend returned in the evening that she told him and the two went to the police station to file a report.
The victim’s boyfriend, Toon Lungkor, 19, said that he was a construction worker and that it took until after dinner that night to cajole the story out of his girlfriend as she was so afraid that he would be angry. He assured her that his anger wasn’t at her but at the thieves and that most of all he felt sadness as it had taken him many months of hard work to save up that much money. The baby is due in ten days and the pair were relying on that cash.
Since the story has been published in the media, it has emerged that this is not a standalone incident and that this gang may have preyed on many other victims, all single women or the elderly who are home alone.