CHUMPHON — Police confiscated more than a half-million methamphetamine tablets during the arrest of four supsects in Pathiu district.
Chumphon natives Worawit Bua-in, 49, Pranee Maithong, 33, Tossaporn Niyomsub, 36, and Chusak Maithong, 42, were taken to a police news conference at the Ban Pala security checkpoint in Khao Chairat sub-district on Tuesday.
Pol Lt Col Chalard Ponakorn, deputy investigative chief at Muang Chumphon police station, said officers found two boxes containing 566,000 ya ba pills in the boot of a Saraburi-registered Toyota Altis after it was pulled over at the Ban Pala checkpoint on Sunday.
An apple logo adorns packages of seized ya ba. (Photo by Amnart Thongdee)
Mr Worawit, who drove the car, reportedly confessed to police that he and three accomplices were hired by a drug gang for 1 million baht to smuggle the narcotics from Nonthaburi's Bang Bua Thong district to the southern province of Trang.
The other suspects were in an Isuzu pickup truck which had driven past the checkpoint. The truck driven by Mrs Pranee was used as a scouting vehicle. Police later chased and intercepted the Chumphon-registered truck and rounded them up.
Officials seized the vehicles and nine mobile phones from the suspects. A further investigation was underway to identify other gang members, Pol Lt Col Chalard said.
Pol Lt Col Chalard said the speed had an estimated street value of at least 170 million baht. It was apple-flavoured and had an apple logo on the package. Each pill cost between 300-350 baht, which is double the price of a unflavoured, lower-quality pills, he said.
An ongoing investigation found some of the seized drugs would be smuggled out of the country to Malaysia, he added.