Police from Chiang Rai’s Mae Chan Police Station arrested a 46-year-old man with 200,000 methamphetamine pills inside his Nissan pickup at a checkpoint yesterday. The man confessed to receiving 30,000 baht to transport the drugs to Thoeng District.
Pol. Col. Kiatsak Chitprasarn, Superintendent of Mae Chan Police Station, said they arrested Mr. Yea Sae Chang, aged 46, from Phayao Province, along with evidence of 200,000 methamphetamine pills and seized his Nissan pickup.
He said police officers from the Investigation Division of Chiang Rai Provincial Police received information that there would be a drug transport from the border area of Mae Chan District to the inner part of the country using a bypass route.
Therefore, he ordered the coordination of checkpoints on secondary roads to inspect suspicious pickup trucks strictly. Officers received information that a drug network was using a white four-door Nissan pickup truck as the vehicle used for transporting drugs.
The vehicle, which was coming from Mae Chan District and heading to Mueang District, Chiang Rai Province, was stopped at the Tha Khao Pluek checkpoint.
Police officers at the checkpoint ordered Mr. Yea to pull his truck to the side for a routine check. When they checked inside the vehicle, they found black garbage bags. When opened, they found about 100 black packages inside, filled with methamphetamine pills.
Mr. Yea was taken into custody along with the evidence and brought to Mae Chan Police Station for questioning.
From the initial interrogation, Mr. Yea confessed to driving from his house in Phu Sang District, Phayao Province, to Mae Chan District, where someone came and drove his car to load the methamphetamine pills, then returned his pickup and told him to drive to Thoeng District, Chiang Rai Province. He was to leave the truck on the side of the road, and then someone would come and pick it up.
He told police he did not know who the drug traffickers were and that he was to receive 30,000 baht after the job was done.
After the investigation, the police officers booked Mr. Yeh and charged him with possession of class one narcotics and drug trafficking.
Pol. Col. Kiatsak said investigators were urgently expanding the investigation to arrest the gang involved in the drug trafficking operation.
In the past week, drug suppression authorities in Chiang Rai province have seized more than 8.9 Million methamphetamine pills at road checkpoints across Chiang Rai Province.
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Geoff Thomas is an award winning journalist known for his sharp insights and no-nonsense reporting style. Over the years he has worked for Reuters and the Canadian Press covering everything from political scandals to human interest stories. He brings a clear and direct approach to his work.
