Police defend response to baby murder Facebook video
Royal Thai Police has defended their response to a horrific video clip of a father murdering his baby daughter that remained on Facebook Live for almost 24 hours before it was removed.
Police Colonel Krissana Pattanacharoen, deputy national police spokesman, said Wednesday that the Technology Crime Suppression Division alerted the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society soon after learning about the video on Monday night, so that the ministry would ask Facebook to remove it.
The footage was online for almost 24 hours from 5.45pm on Monday before it was taken down.
Krissana blamed the delay partly on the time difference between Thailand and the United States, where Facebook is headquartered. He said that even in the US, in took seven to eight hours before similar content was removed from Facebook.
He said this was believed to be among the first cases of such a violent crime to be broadcast on Facebook.
Wuttisan Wongtalay, 20, recorded a video of him hanging his 11-month-old daughter from the roof of an abandoned building in Phuket. He took his own life later. He was believed to be driven by jealousy, as he was afraid his wife would leave him for another man.
The police spokesman also urged the public to help alert authorities about social media content they deem inappropriate.
“We have only a handful of police officers on duty [to monitor the web] so we have to rely heavily on the public to keep us informed,” he said.
Police also plan to discuss how to expedite the removal of inappropriate content from social media following the latest incident, Krissana said.
The focus would be on major forums such as Facebook, YouTube and Instagram, he said.