The Criminal Court's ruling on the death of a former land official while in Department of Special Investigation (DSI) custody is a twist in the high-profile case that got the institute in hot water. Thawatchai Anukul, a 66-year-old former land official, was found dead at a detention facility on the sixth floor of the DSI headquarters on Aug 29 last year. He was in the process of being probed in connection with accusations of land document fraud involving the unlawful issuance of land title deeds for more than a thousand plots in national parks across Phuket and Phangnga.
Thawatchai had worked at the Land Office in Phangnga province.
Initially, the DSI concluded that Thawatchai committed suicide by strangling himself. In its autopsy report, the DSI said the man wrapped his socks around his neck and attached them to a door hinge.
The report also said Thawatchai, who was found unconscious, was sent to Mongkutwattana Hospital where medical personnel spent three hours trying to resuscitate him before he was pronounced dead.
Thawatchai's younger brother Chainarong has disputed the suicide claims. From the beginning, he believed that his brother's death was a murder involving influential people, including some state officials.
Chainarong voiced his suspicion of the forensic report, requesting a second examination on Thawatchai's body with the participation of officials from the police's Institute of Forensic Medicine alongside the DSI forensic team.
He also asked the Justice Ministry to look into the case. The ministry subsequently set up a committee comprising medical experts to re-examine the case.
The DSI later entered a spat with Mongkutwattana Hospital after suggesting that Thawatchai might have died from the resuscitation process that caused his liver to rupture.
The claim was quickly dismissed by Rienthong Nanna, director of Mongkutwattana Hospital. The director said it was not possible that Thawatchai's death was caused by resuscitation.
The case is still clouded with suspicion. The DSI admitted during the investigation last year that not all the closed-circuit cameras at its detention facility where Thawatchai was kept under custody worked properly at the time of his death.
Last year, at the peak of the case's publicity, Dr Rienthong alluded to discrepancies in the DSI's account.
He posted on his Facebook profile last year that DSI officials who sent Thawatchai to hospital informed its personnel that the man had fainted. Nothing was mentioned about suicide attempts.
The court on Friday ruled that Thawatchai died of suffocation and a ruptured liver that caused abdominal haemorrhaging after being struck by a blunt object.
The suffocation was a result of Thawatchai's neck being constricted with shoelaces, said the ruling.
Although the ruling fell short of pinpointing who brought about the two causes of death, it confirmed the death occurred while Thawatchai was detained by the DSI.
Upon hearing the ruling, Chainarong said the court clearly indicated that his brother's death was caused by another person, not from hanging himself as previously suggested in DSI reports.
Before handing down the ruling, the court heard testimonies from two DSI officials and a security guard who was on duty at the detention facility where Thawatchai was detained before he died.
The two DSI officials were Chayapol Wancha-em, the head of the DSI officers responsible for detaining suspects, and Pol Lt Col Phairoj Laorattananurak, a deputy head of the same group of officers.
The court was to send the ruling to the prosecutors while the DSI pledged to fully cooperate with Thung Song Hong police in probing into who actually caused Thawatchai's death.
It's a shame that one year after Thawatchai's death the public is still kept in the dark about it.
Death in state custody is not new in Thailand -- though this is the first time that it has happened at the DSI. Rarely have investigations come out with satisfying, close-ended conclusions.
The court ruling on Friday means the case will be reopened for further investigation. If it was indeed a murder, as implicated by evidence, those assigned to solve the mystery are faced with the enormous task of tracking down who was behind the crime.
With regard to public expectations, investigators must do their best to clear the air and prove that justice prevails.