‘Teacher not scapegoat’ top police officer claims

THE high-profile case of former teacher Jomsap Saenmuangkhot, who was released two years ago by royal pardon after she was sentenced and jailed for a hit-and-run killing in 2005, has taken a new twist after a senior police officer insisted yesterday that the teacher really committed the crime.
Police Inspector-General Pol General Panya Mamen said in a press conference in Nakhon Phanom province that a reinvestigation into the case reaffirmed that Jomsap drove the pickup truck that hit and killed a man in the province in 2005.
Panya alleged that a group of people were assigned to systematically set up evidence in order to persuade others that the teacher was the scapegoat.
Panya said police were now investigating the man who allegedly confessed to driving the car that killed the cyclist.
He said the confirmation that Jomsap committed the crime was the result of a reinvestigation into the case by several police teams who visited the scene of crime and re-examined the documents involved.
Meanwhile a witness testimony session for Jomsap’s case at Nakhon Phanom Provincial Court, scheduled for yesterday, was postponed to February 8-10 after Jomsap’s witnesses, including the alleged “real culprit”, a Mukdahan man, and a female witness failed to show up, an informed source at the court said.
The information from the session – where prosecutors intended to interview eight more witnesses – would be submitted for the Supreme Court’s consideration if it could be regarded as new evidence that might pave the way for reopening of the case and a retrial.
After the meeting with the court judge, Jomsap briefly thanked sympathisers and media members before she was led away by relatives.
Meanwhile, Buri Ram-based teacher association president Prayat Warong said that he hoped Jomsap, who lost her freedom despite being reportedly innocent, would get justice and be reinstated as a teacher.
Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha yesterday said that if the ongoing probe confirmed that the former teacher was innocent, she would be provided with remedial measures.
He also urged people not to assume that the whole agency was problematic because such an issue could happen everywhere in the world. “You have to see it case-by-case and investigate who are the wrongdoers. If she is deemed innocent, she should be able to get back to her teaching career,” the premier said.
Permanent Secretary for Education Chaiyapruek Serirak said that if Jomsap wished to be reinstated as a teacher, she must file a request to the director of a respective educational service area office so he could table it at the provincial education committee meeting.
As a public schoolteacher’s reinstatement required a teaching licence, the authority would also check the status of her teacher licence, he explained.
Education Council deputy chief Somsak Dolprasit said Jomsap’s teacher licence had expired in 2014 during her court trial and she didn’t file for licence renewal within the deadline.
He said she would have to re-apply for a teaching licence at the Education Council’s Secretary Office.
Office of Basic Education Commission chief Karun Sakulpradit said he assigned deputy Boonrak Yodphetch to visit the north-eastern province and check if Jomsap was entitled to be reinstated and any decide on other compensations.