Thai woman, victim of drug gang hired to carry ice concealed in instant coffee packets into Japan, has returned to Thailand, as narcotics suppression police expand their investigation and arrest members of a Vietnamese network, charging them with transnational crime.
Today (1 Aug.), Police Lieutenant General Achyon Kraithong, Commander of the Narcotics Suppression Bureau (NSB), announced progress in the case of Miss Chuthathip, a Thai woman who was hired to carry a parcel to Japan and was subsequently found to have methamphetamine (ice) hidden inside instant coffee sachets. A joint investigation with Japanese authorities and the Office of the Narcotics Control Board (ONCB) has established that the operation is the work of a Vietnamese network operating as a transnational criminal organisation.
Pol. Lt. Gen. Achyon revealed that police have issued arrest warrants for two suspects and have already apprehended one — a Vietnamese woman who handled the transfer of the courier payment — on 28 July. The other suspect, the operator of a LINE account under the name "ING ING" who served as the hirer and dispatcher of the parcel, has had an arrest warrant issued but has fled the country.
Meanwhile, Japanese prosecutors have decided not to indict Miss Chuthathip, the Thai woman who was hired to carry the parcel, and have returned her to Thailand. The NSB has invited her in for questioning, and her testimony has been helpful and consistent with the evidence already gathered.
Pol. Lt. Gen. Achyon also stated that one suspect has now been arrested, that a search for the remaining suspect is ongoing, and that additional arrest warrants for other members of the network are being prepared. He also warned the public not to accept items to store or carry abroad on behalf of people they do not know or trust, as doing so could make them an unwitting tool of a transnational criminal network and result in prosecution without their knowledge.
