A 61 year old woman has been accused of hiring a hitman to kill the homeless man found under a bridge last week.
According to police, The 58 year old Phrao man, found nearly decapitated under a bridge crossing the Ping River in Mae Rim, was killed by a man hired to murder him.
The homeless man had been divorced for three years and had ended up homeless after leaving his wife, according to those who knew him. He had been living under the bridge for a couple of years.
On the night of his murder he was drinking with some people at a nearby bar, who saw him have words with Pankaew Kankaew, a local man from Mae Rim. When police questioned him, he confessed to the killing, saying he was hired by Bualoy Tala, 61, a woman who is also from Mae Rim, who paid him 40,000 baht.
Police questioned Bualoy who denied the allegations, saying that she had hired Pankaew to rough up the victim after hearing that he had been spreading false rumours that they were in a relationship.
Police were suspicious of Bualoy’s denial, however, and witnesses have been found who have corroborated Pankaew’s accusation.
According to police, Bualoy had contacted the victim’s wife three years ago offering to help pay half of the 700 baht per month insurance fee to cover his funeral costs. She claimed to be sorry for the woman who had no money and said that she would simply collect her money back as half the insurance payout when it came time for the victim’s funeral.
Pankaew said that he had followed the victim down to the river on the night of the murder and hacked at him with a large knife.
Police allege that Bualoy had been plotting the victim’s death for over a month as she will be paid out many hundreds of thousands of baht in insurance money. Police are investigating two other suspicious deaths over the past two years of people whose funeral insurance was also covered by Bualoy.