Four years after the mysterious death of a conscript, Private Wichian Puaksom, at Peeleng army camp in Narathiwat, the Public Sector Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC) has finally decided to find an army lieutenant and 10 other drill masters guilty of malfeasance in office and causing Private Wichian's death.
The PACC's decision, although belated, is welcome.
However it is still too early to tell for sure that justice will be served and the alleged perpetrators responsible for the conscript's death will be punished accordingly.
The victim's family lodged a complaint with the South-based 4th Army Region around four years ago after they learned of his mysterious death at a hospital in Narathiwat on June 5, 2011. The family was informed by an officer from the camp of the victim's "escape" from the camp and, again, by another officer the following day that the victim had been found.
But neither of them told the family the news about his hospitalisation and his actual condition, let alone the truth that he had been badly beaten up, allegedly by his drill masters under the command of a lieutenant.
Then commander of the 4th Army Region, Lt Gen Udomchai Thammasaroj, ordered a fact-finding investigation in response to the family's complaint. But little progress was made.
A relative of the victim told Isra News Agency that the fact-finding probe was launched only after the family took the case directly to Gen Prem Tinsulanonda, president of the Privy Council. The probe panel found the complaint was substantiated and the case was later forwarded to the PACC.
Nine officers, excluding the lieutenant, were eventually prosecuted in military court. The 4th Army Region agreed to award the victim's family seven million baht in compensation. It was reported that some of the drill masters were detained as punishment, but no legal action has been taken against them, particularly the lieutenant who is said to be the son of an army general.
The case of Private Wichian's death in an army camp would have been swept under the carpet like many other mysterious deaths and torture cases involving suspected militants held in military custody in the restive deep South, had it not been for the tireless efforts of his family and human rights advocacy groups to end boot camp violence.
That can be achieved only if the military stops allowing army camps to be run as twilight zones.
The deaths of two lese majeste suspects at the 11th Army Circle should serve as a wake-up call for the regime to effect change. Detention centres inside military camps such as the one at the 11th Army Circle are completely closed to the media and relatives of the detainees.
The detention cell in which Pol Maj Prakrom Warunprapa, one of the recent alleged lese majeste offenders, was found hanged in what appeared to be a suicide, is said to be windowless with one door which is closed most of the time and with no one able to see in from the outside.
The death of "Mor Yong", or Suriyan Sucharitpolwong, while in detention at the Corrections Department's hospital from a blood infection as claimed by the Corrections Department has raised more eyebrows following Pol Maj Prakrom's alleged suicide.
The military needs to be more transparent in its treatment of suspects under its custody if it wishes to earn the trust and confidence of international and local human rights groups and the public.
It can start by opening up the detention facility at the 11th Army Circle where alleged lese majeste offenders and the two Erawan shrine bombing suspects are being held for inspection by the media, as recently proposed by a human rights activist.