Crime
Drug Runners Arrested Phrae Province with 5 Million Meth Pills from Chiang Rai
PHRAE – Two alleged drug runners were apprehended and 5 million speed pills seized from their pickup truck after a brief car chase in Song district on Saturday.
A combined team of police, soldiers and local officials manning a checkpoint in tambon Huay Mai spotted a suspicious Ford pickup truck and signalled the driver to stop for a search at around 9.30am on Saturday.
However, the driver refused, quickly changed direction and sped off alongside an irrigation canal, prompting officers to give chase.
As the escape route was a blind alley, the driver had no choice but to abandon the vehicle. He and another man tried to flee on foot but were soon caught.
Thirty-five plastic bags containing 5 million speed pills are seized from a pickup abandoned after a chase in Song district of Phrae on Saturday. – Photo Taweeporn Sukkasem
Officers searched the vehicle and found 30 black plastic bags in the back and another five in the front seat. They contained 5 million speed pills in total.
Driver Sompong Takkrathanachuchai, 24, and Surachai Songtisaichoke, 24, both from Phop Phra district in Tak, were taken for interrogation at the Song police station.
Mr Sompong told police that he had been hired to smuggle the drugs from Chiang Rai to Bangkok.
An Isuzu pickup driven by a man he identified as Lee Sae Song led him along the smuggling route, he said.
Police radioed officers at other checkpoints to block the vehicle but it was not located.
The seizure took place after Pol Maj Gen Thanarat Chumsawat, chief of the Phrae police, received information that a large quantity of illicit drugs would be smuggled into the northern province.
By Taweeporn Sukkasem
The Bangkok Post
