Premchai to be charged for possession of illegal guns

Deputy national police chief Pol General Srivara Rangsibhramanakul yesterday said he had instructed Kanchanaburi police to file complaints with the Natural Resources and Environmental Crime Division police over the illegal guns.

He said the police in Thong Pha Phum district had been told to file the complaint by yesterday.
Premchai Karnasuta, president of ITD, a company listed on the stock exchange, was arrested with three other suspects early this month and charged with nine counts of poaching in the Thung Yai Naresuan Wildlife sanctuary in Kanchanaburi province.
Forest rangers and police allegedly found remains of a protected black leopard, pheasant and barking deer as well as hunting rifles from his campsite at a prohibited location. The investigation was expanded to his residence in Bangkok where 43 guns were found, six of them allegedly illegal.
Srivara said that police were gathering and testing evidence to back up the charges, including items seized from the campsite such as rifles and a vehicle and those found at his house, including two pairs of tusks. Srivara said the results of the tests on tusks would come out on March 10.

Forensics officials will look into mobile phones seized from Premchai and other suspects to scrutinise stored photos, as well as telephone numbers they had called before entering the World Heritage sanctuary.
Pol Maj-General Thawatchai Mekprasertsuk, forensics chief, said the leopard had eight traces of 20mm bullets. However, because the animal had already been butchered, the officers did not have any bullets to test.
Forensics officers found spent shells of 20mm bullets shot from a gun at the scene and Premchai’s DNA sample was allegedly found on the trigger.
Thawatchai said that the investigative reports were expected to be completed by March 24.