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| Panuwat is dumped at Chang Yai temple |
Municipal staff were called to Chang Yai temple in Thung Fon district, Udon Thani last week after reports emerged on social media that a crippled man, later identified as Panuwat, or Lung Than, 45, had been dumped there by a woman on a motorbike.
She had propped him on the back of her motorcycle and tied his body around her own waist for the 50km journey from Wang Thong in Ban Dung district, where they lived.
However, evidently tiring of the weighty burden, she left him at the temple for safekeeping until his family could pick him up.
Monks provided the man with a mattress, pillow and mosquito net. Panuwat’s eldest daughter, Darika, 28, heard about the incident on social media and realised the man dumped at the temple was her father. She picked him up and took him back to the family home in Kumphawapi district.
Darika said her father’s mistress, Pakdee, 42, had told the family she was returning Panuwat to their care, but left him at the temple rather than taking him to the family home as agreed.
She said Pakdee treated her father no better than an unwanted cat and dog, discarded by locals at temples in the same manner.
Panuwat had a stroke a year ago and can no longer walk. After initially looking after him, Pakdee last week called his mother, Dokmai, 72, saying she was moving to Bangkok for work. She asked his family to pick up Panuwat at her place in Ban Dung district.
However, Dokmai asked her to drop him off at their family home in Kumphawapi district and offered to send petrol money. Dokmai, who is shocked about what happened to her son, said she wants to know what drove Pakdee four years ago to lure away a man who was lawfully wedded to his wife. “She has a black heart,” she said.
Recalling Panuwat’s stroke last year, his wife, Laddawan Prachantasen, 43, said her eldest daughter had offered to take over his care but Pakdee said she would carry on with the burden herself. However, she asked the family to send financial help.
“I thought the girls were still worried about their father, so we cobbled together 2,000-3,000 baht a month. But then she went and dumped him at the temple. I can’t accept it and want the police to take action,” Ms Laddawan said.
After retrieving Panuwat, she and the couple’s three daughters visited Thung Fon police.
Ms Laddawan said she and the girls went to Bangkok to work four years ago, leaving her husband alone in Kumphawapi. They seldom returned home.
Later she discovered he was seeing Pakdee. “I asked him to choose between me and the girls and his new fling, but he chose his mistress and moved in with her at Ban Dung.
“Now, however, his minor wife is also unwell and I think she figured that Panuwat has only limited ability to care for her so asked to give him back.”
After visiting the police, the trio travelled to Pakdee’s place in Ban Dung to ask for his ID card and his meds.
They took along the village headman as their witness. However, they came upon Pakdee’s son, who angrily drove them out, saying they had brought his mother’s name into disrepute.
They fled rather than risk a confrontation. Later, two women from Pakdee’s family, her mother Heow and aunt, Naree, visited the trio with the village head as intermediary, asking for understanding.
Pakdee, they said, was mentally unwell. She was taking Panuwat to the doctor, they claimed, but dumped him at the temple instead. “She is really ill and forgetful, and does things without being aware of them. Please don’t take legal action,” they said.
Reporters went to see Panawut, now staying at his wife’s home.
He said Pakdee took him to Chang Yai temple and told him to wait there for his family to pick him up. She called his mother to say where she had left him, but did not return.
“I am not upset that I was dumped, because I have known Pakdee for many years and still love her. However, I won’t go back to her,” he said.
Ms Laddawan said she no longer loves her husband but would take him back as the pair still share emotional and family bonds. The drama continues.
Shameless beggar-thief
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| Sumalee slaps beggar-thief Ood across the face with her shoe |
Muang police were called to the shop on Sri Chom Chuen Road in Mak Khaeng sub-district after locals identified the beggar-thief, Ood Khunthianpradit, 45, originally from Nong Wua So district.
CCTV vision showed him going from shop to shop asking for food, including their own steak house.
They had fed him many times out of pity, but on the night of July 21, they said, Mr Ood had rewarded their generosity by stealing the family’s Kawasaki BN175, which they had parked by the side of the shop.
Somkiat Malai, 62, the owner, and his niece, Sumalee Chanruang, 41, called police asking them to come and arrest Mr Ood.
When police arrived, the women pointed to Mr Ood as the thief. Mr Ood, rather than submit to arrest, fled into a scrub forest behind a nearby convenience store.
Police searched for him for 30 minutes without success, so asked Sudsakorn Bussadee, a helper of the owner’s, to keep watch. When Mr Ood walked back out, he grabbed him and alerted the police.
Mr Ood admitted stealing the bike, which had a sidecar attached, and selling it for 10,000 baht to buy speed pills. When the pills ran out he went back to begging in the municipal area.
Hearing this, an angry Ms Sumalee took off her yellow plastic shoe and slapped him across the face 4–5 times as locals tried to restrain her.
“He begged for food at our shop, and we fed him because we felt sorry for him. I didn’t think he would betray us this way. The bike cost 120,000 baht,” she said. Mr Ood sold it in his home district. Police seized the bike as evidence and charged Mr Ood with theft.
Speed pill guilt
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| Usa turns up with a bag of personal effects |
Usa (no surname given), 44, who hails from across the border and lives with his boss in Hang Dong district, turned up with a small bag of personal effects and a bag of instant noodles, asking to be put in the clink.
He had taken a speed pill with friends the night before, he said, and woke up feeling guilty.
He decided to hand himself in and thought a stay in the police cells would be a suitable punishment.
Police asked to look at his papers and found his work permit still has five years to run. They also asked about his friends, hoping to find his supplier, but Usa would not say.
Police, still baffled as to why he would give himself in, gave him two choices: he could seek treatment in detox as a patient, or be sent to court as an offender.
Usa said he had no money to pay a fine so repeated his request that they put him in jail.
A urine test, however, found he had no drugs in his system, further bewildering police.
However, he did smell of alcohol and they suspected their visitor was actually drunk.
They gave him a lecture about the dangers of drug use and sent him on his way.
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