Grisly water jar find, mother exits, knife man strikes

Nasty end for mother-in-law

The large water jar containing a body.

A Nakhon Pathom man who stabbed his nagging mother-in-law to death and stuffed her body in a large water jar insists her daughter was not part of the plot, even though they fled the scene of the crime together.

Police nabbed Chonnatee “Jeen” Uamthong, 23 and his wife, Tharathip “Beer” Rueang-Anansakul, 27 at a petrol station in Kamphaeng Saen district on Oct 9.

Media reports initially said the pair were joint suspects in the Oct 4 killing of Suwan, 54, at her house in Borabue district of Maha Sarakham, where both suspects lived along with their young child.

They fled together with their child when locals started asking questions about the victim’s whereabouts.

However, the case took a new twist when, following their arrest, Chonnatee insisted he had committed the murder alone, and that his wife merely accompanied him.

Their four-day flight from the law took them first to Bangkok and then to Nakhon Pathom, where the couple dropped off their young child, aged three months, with Chonnatee’s aunt.

They then headed to Phetchaburi before returning to his home province as they were worried about their child, who was ailing. However, they were identified at the petrol station on the night of Oct 9 and arrested.

Chonnatee Uamthong and his wife

Chonnatee told police he grew fed up with Suwan’s constant nagging about his not having a job and asking constantly for money, so at 6am picked up a kitchen knife and stabbed her 13 times.

He dragged the body to the side of the house and stuffed it in a large water jar, concealing the blood trail with sand. He also wiped the blood stains from the knife and replaced it in the kitchen, and washed his blood-stained shirt, which he hid in his bedroom.

Two hours later, Chonnatee took his victim’s gold necklace, and accompanied by Tharathip sold it in town for 17,000 baht.

He says he didn’t tell his wife that he had killed her mother until they returned home.

Tharathip, for her part, admits taking a look at the body in the jar but says she was too scared to go to the police as Chonnatee threatened to kill her if she did.

“We carried on with our lives as if nothing had happened until locals turned up looking for my mother, when we fled,” she said.

The couple told locals that the victim had gone into the forest to pick mushrooms but searchers found blood around the lid of the jar and looked inside, when they discovered the body.

Tharathip said she accompanied her husband on the escape as she was worried about their child, whom they took with them.

Police took the couple for a crime reconstruction, when 100 people who turned out let off a cheer, as they were relieved the couple had been caught.

Chonnatee’s grandmother, Lod Uamthong, 69, said the young man served jail time as a teen after molesting a 14-year-old relative at her place in Sam Ngam of Nakhon Pathom. He was high on ya ba at the time.

“When he got out he asked to stay with me but I refused as she did not want a repeat of the incident,” she said. “He found love with Tharathip instead in Maha Sarakham.”

Asked why her husband did it it, Tharathip said her mother had once suggested that if she couldn’t afford to raise their newborn she should flush it down the toilet. “That caused resentment,” she said.

Media reports say police charged both with Suwan’s murder.

Mother foists burden on family

A Kalasin woman has left her mother with the burden of raising her five children, after taking her own life and that of her husband’s following a row over drugs.

Suphatra, 37, shot her husband, Parada Yotraksa, 33, at their home in So Phisai district as he was sharpening a knife by the side of the house about 2pm on Oct 7.

Her mother Yuphin, 61, who was nearby, said Suphatra shot her husband following a row, and took off on a motorcycle. Locals found her in a family-owned rubber plantation early the next morning. She had shot herself dead with the same weapon she used to shoot her husband.

Yuphin said her daughter had three children from her first marriage and another two children, both twins, born on May 27, with the man she was to kill. The pair argued often, family members say, usually over drugs.

The twins born to the couple who are now dead.

“I was feeding the chickens at my daughter’s place when I heard the gunfire. Suphatra was holding the gun and walking out of the house. I asked my daughter why she shot him but she did not reply and fled on her motorcycle,” she said later.

The couple had been together a year, she said, adding the burden of raising the five children would now fall to her, as there was no one else.

Reporters visited a local temple for Parada’s funeral, where they spoke to his mother, Busaba, 54.

She said she didn’t live nearby and did not know much about her son’s drug habit, but knew the couple argued a lot.

“He was sitting sharpening a knife by the side of the house when she shot him from behind,” she said. At first she was angry but after hearing the killer had since taken her own life, her stance had softened.

Old man killed having a ciggie

Nopporn Kantiyaporn and his son.

A father who stabbed an elderly man to death outside a cinema complex in Nonthaburi says he was merely protecting his son.

Police nabbed Nopporn Kantiyaporn, 39, for stabbing to death Kamphon Kritsopee, 66, in front of the Major Cineplex on Oct 9.

Trader Wilaiwan Panphit, 26, who was selling goods nearby, said the victim was sitting having a smoke when the suspect, sitting with his 3-4 year-old child, attacked him.

“The father pulled out phone and took the victim’s picture. The victim asked why they were taking it and they started to argue. The suspect stored his phone in his backpack and brought out a knife, stabbing the victim three or four times,” she said.

She said the victim walks in the area regularly.

CCTV vision at the scene shows the suspect with his son fleeing on a motorcycle taxi to Phibun Songkhram Road. From there he took a taxi to Bang Wa BTS, and walked to Phetkasem Road.

Police say they caught up with Nopporn, originally from Pathum Thani, on Oct 12 in the Sathorn area. He claims the victim approached him aggressively and blew cigarette smoke in his child’s face so he responded by attacking him.

“I was feeding my child and was worried he had a weapon. We both attacked each other but I was acting in self-defence and did not mean to kill him,” he added, apologising to the victim’s family.

Police, however, say Nopporn has a history of such offending.

He was charged with carrying a weapon without justification in Sutthisan and Thong Lor districts, and charged with harming people in Phaya Thai. He has now been charged with killing the old man.