Death in the trees, rapist leaves number, bloody foot probe

Don’t look up now

Rasamee Donnuea and her family visit the police.

Roi Et provincial police are heeding a mother’s pleas to take another look at the mysterious death of her son, after a mushroom picker found his remains hanging 15m up in a tree.

Rasamee Donnuea, 59, accompanied by her daughter, Piyaporn Ekanuch, 34, visited the region’s police last week after turning to a local webpage to air their plight.

Ms Rasamee said local police were too quick to dismiss the case as suicide when for her, many questions remain unanswered about the plight of her son, Natthaphol “Beer” Wongsuwan, 26.

A mushroom picker found his remains on Aug 4 when fossicking about a forest in Pathum Rat district. He found a skull on the ground which bore signs of having been hit in the left cheek with a blunt object.

When the mushroom picker looked up he saw a pair of jeans, belt, boxer shorts and a yellow shirt, still strung up in the branches of the tree above, along with a green nylon rope. He also found some shoes close to the fallen skull.

Ms Rasamee and her family identified the body as Beer’s, even though it had decomposed, as they recognised the clothing. The lad went missing in March after a village friend, Terl, one of four locals to whom he was close, took him to a shop to pawn his phone.

Natthaphol ‘Beer’ Wongsuwan

He did not return home again, though for weeks the family was under the mistaken impression he had accompanied another friend, Tao, to the provinces in search of work, so were not unduly alarmed.

Relatives caught up with Tao during Songkran when he returned to the village. They asked after Beer, but he told them he had not accompanied him on the trip. The family, realising the lad was missing, went to the police.

After the case failed to make progress, in desperation they turned to a fortune teller, who said they would find the lad in the forest. His family, including elder sister Piyaporn, with whom he was living when he went missing, joined the search.

They inspected the spot where the mushroom picker later was to find his skull, which presumably fell to the ground as his body, still up in the branches, decomposed, but on the day they searched the area did not find anything. It wasn’t until the mushroom picker made his grisly discovery that the family realised they had found their missing son.

However, Ms Rasamee said her family wants police to look into whether foul play was involved. “My son had no problems with anyone and if he was thinking of taking his own life, why there, in a forest he had never visited?

“His clothes were found 15m up, which means he would have to climb the tree first. And the rope was found around the trunk of his remains, which is not where you would expect to find it,” she said last week after appealing to a local webpage, Khao San Planchai, for help.

Admin from the webpage later took her to meet the head of Roi Et provincial police, Pol Lt Gen Kittisak Chamrasprasert, who ordered his probe team to take over the case. Provincial police also helped pay to have the lad’s remains DNA-tested in Bangkok. The case continues.

Meek apology leads to arrest

Asakorn’s hand-written apology.

A hand-written apology left by an attempted rapist who fled the home of his victim when she called for help led police directly to their suspect.

Tha Kham police in Bang Khun Thian district last week nabbed Asakorn “Golf” Oungansin, 34, after he meekly returned to his victim’s house to leave a note apologising for his misdeeds. Helpfully for police, it even included a contact number.

His victim, A, 24, contacted police after she found the note, after earlier alerting them to the attack. They asked her to lure Golf back to the spot. They took cover and when he turned up, appeared from hiding to arrest him. They found a 15cm fruit knife tucked into his waistband, the same knife which he admitted using to threaten his victim the day before.

Golf broke into A’s house in soi 43, Phra Ram II Road, on Aug 5, held the knife to throat, and throttled her.

 Lek faces an arson charge.

He demanded sex, but she called out to her younger brother for help. Golf chased the younger brother with the knife, but then abandoned the attack and fled on his motorbike.

He had let himself in the front door, which was unlocked, confronting A as she emerged from a second-storey bedroom. A day later, Golf returned to the spot to hang a bag on her fence, CCTV vision shows.

He bought her a snack by way of apology, which he left in the bag along with a note which read: “I bought you a snack. I am sorry, and don’t forget to take your meds. If I can help, call me.” The meds referred to any medical care she sought after the attack.

At the police’s request, she called asking him to bring her some soothing gel. Media images show police arresting him as he returned on his bike, which bore no registration plate. They thrust him to the ground and cuffed him.

Police say a check of his record revealed he had been jailed three times previously, in Bangkok and Nonthaburi, for trespass and sexual harassment. He was released most recently in October last year. Golf was renting a place nearby the victim. Police suspect he fancied A and had been keeping an eye on her for a while.

A drugs test showed he tested positive for speed, which he admits taking before the attack and again before turning up with the gel. Police charged him with drugs offences and attempted rape.

Bloody footprints tell it all

The house where the teacher’s body was found.

A Roi Et druggie who set fire to his own home after arguing with his mother denies he also beat to death a neighbour across the road.

Si Somdet police nabbed Lek, 25, outside his home after his family called for help. Lek had argued with his mother and set fire to the place, news reports said. Across the road from his place is a house owned by retired teacher Chamraslak Surasen, or Khru Daow, 67, and her husband Dilek.

Mr Dilek had just returned from a nearby farm field when he saw police arrive to subdue Lek. After watching them cart him away, he went inside only to find the body of his wife lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Khru Daow’s body with a split skull and bearing signs she had been beaten about the face. Suspicion fell on Lek, a local druggie with psychiatric problems, even though no one saw him cross the road to his neighbour’s house.

Channel 8 TV says his elder brother, Arm, 35, a soldier, held his younger brother until police arrived. Lek was sitting outside, smiling to himself and talking nonsense, it said. Another version of the events say Lek tried to set fire to the teacher’s home, and was found sitting outside her place when locals turned up to put out the blaze. Lek was later questioned about the death of Khru Daow. He denied killing her, though Channel 8 said police found blood on his foot.

Kittipong Butsang, the village headman, said he also found a blood trail on the grass outside leading to a nearby wall. “I asked a youngster nearby if he had seen anything. He said he saw Lek holding an object with a long handle climb the wall,” he said.

Arm, the suspect’s elder brother, said Lek started going off the rails after his wife left him and he turned to drugs. “Our family was close to the victim and I never thought such a thing could happen,” he said.

Police were holding Lek initially on an arson charge as they await the results of DNA tests. If the blood sample found on his foot matches that of the victim he will be charged with premeditated murder.