Thailand's Daily Crime Pill #12: Yippee Ki Yay, it's Monday
And I'm here to share the weekend's bounty of Thai crime news.
Dear expats and readers,
It’s been a hell of a weekend, so I’ll cut the fluff and jump right into the thick of things.
British drug baron Jonathan Moorby’s been sentenced to an additional 14 years in the big house for leading an organized network of narcotics trafficking.
He ran his cocaine smuggling business for years while on the lam in Koh Samui Thailand — finally being extradited in 2019.
According to reports, his gang transported millions of pounds worth of cocaine into the UK using remote holiday rentals as secret drop off points.
One of the unexpected consequences of the pandemic: you can’t just flee charges in your home country and land on two feet in Thailand anymore — well, I guess you can: but you’ll spend two weeks in ASQ hotels first.
Which makes us wonder — what’s the worse of the two alternatives?
This report perked my ears — Chinese conspiracy theories are infiltrating Thai media on subjects ranging from COVID-19 to democracy protests in Hong Kong.
China seems to play the long-game when it comes to global influence, and getting cozy with media is one of its well-played cards.
Putting this damn pandemic to the side for a moment — yes, I’m sick of it, if you can’t tell — Chinese nationals make up 27% of Thailand’s foreign visitors, and China surpassed Japan with foreign investment in Thailand in 2020.
But as China’s long arm dips into the Thai cookie jar with foreign investment, tourism, and an eventual high-speed train to link nations, the scepter of crime will be sure to follow.
Consider this analysis of criminal risk factors in relation to China’s Belt and Road Initiative. The three main risk areas are bribery and corruption; trade-based money laundering; and the rise of criminal business actors.
True Crime Thailand has written a bit on Zhao Wei and the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone, which sits as a Chinese plot of leased land in Laos just on the other side of the Mekong from Chiang Saen, Thailand.
Zhao Wei participated in the groundbreaking ceremony for a Laotian port in the town of Ban Mom — and sunk $50 million in the project himself.
Mr. Wei’s influence on the Mekong region — including Thailand — can’t be ignored, but whether or not he has direct ties back to the CCP is yet to be seen.
What was seen this past weekend, though, was AUD $100 million shipment of crystal meth — 316 kilos of the stuff — in a Thai shipping barge found at Port Botany, Australia.
The narcotics were found in boxes among water heaters and BBQs, and had come from Thailand.
That stuff was likely produced somewhere in Shan State, Myanmar or even Laos, trafficked into Thailand through notoriously porous borders, and then loaded up at a Thai port to set sail for more profitable pastures abroad.
I reckon that some big drug pusher’s not happy with the news as that bust would be a significant blow to their hard-work and investment.
Speaking of business & crime…
I’ve recently launched a second true crime brand called The Main Streeter.
What can you expect with it?
The Main Streeter is a curated newsletter of true crime business stories from around the world that we bet you missed.
From Main Street to Wall Street, London to Hong Kong. Fraud, narco-networks, murder, crypto-scams, ransomware and more.
The Main Streeter keeps tabs on the most interesting business crime stories out there with follow-up and analysis. We do the dirty work of finding the numbers behind the crime. And we we follow the lucrative roads that money walks in the business of crime to answer questions such as:
Who gets a cut of that ransomware payoff?
How much profit is there in South East Asia meth production?
What’s it cost to get somebody whacked in your country?
Where are the blind-spots in your business that criminals will exploit in the future?
Five days a week The Main Streeter puts out Snuffed & Purloined, with a special deep-dive weekend edition on a story of interest.
This publication is, and will always remain, free — you can subscribe by clicking here for the first article and enter your email.
That’s all for today…
Until tomorrow’s Crime Pill, stay safe out there everybody.
- True Crime Thailand