Senior Female Police Officer From Chiangrai Arrested

 

Pol Lt Col Sirat Jaichum, aged 44, a senior officer with the Phaya Mengrai police station, was introduced at a press conference attended by Phayao Governor Pongsak Wangsamer, Pol Maj Gen Jarin Insuwanno, the Phayao police chief, Wichai Chaimongkol, provincial legal execution chief and Pichet Danphikul, an officer with the Office of the Narcotics Control Board’s Chiang Mai office who led the raid on the drugstore.

A woman police lieutenant-colonel in Chiang Rai was arrested on Wednesday for allegedly supplying immense amounts of chilled relief pills to a drug gang in Burma for use as a precursor substance to produce methamphetamine, police said.

Pol Lt Col Sirat allegedly confessed to smuggling the precursor drug in to Burma.

He was arrested after police in neighbouring Chiang Mai province raided a pharmacy suspected of having sent her a immense amount of chilled relief pills, the press conference was told.

Mr Chaichai admitted that he had sent the pills to Pol Lt Col Sirat, using a delivery service offered by the intercity bus, according to police.

Chaichai Prichaphilak, 57, the pharmacy owner, was wanted by police for involvement with a gang supplying chilled relief drugs that contained pseudoephedrine, a precursor for producing methamphetamine, to a drug manufacturer in Burma.

On Aug 14, some villagers reported to Phayao police that they had discovered empty boxes for over 200,000 chilled relief pills and again on Aug 30, similar boxes for about 170,000 such pills were found left in a canal.

Police had also obtained a record of unusual funds transfers between Mr Chaichai and Pol Lt Col Sirat.
He sent the drugs to Pol Lt Col Sirat in Phayao, her hometown. He then hired her relatives to remove the pills for their containers which were later thrown away.

Pol Lt Col Sirat told police that he had delivered the pills to a woman identified only as Suk on the other side of the Thai-Burmese border in Chiang Rai’s Mae Sai district. He said he put the drugs in the back of her automobile and normally showed her police ID card to get through the border check without being searched, the press conference was told.

Police began an inquiry.