Incompetent killer

Police quickly solve wedding murder

The happy couple and the other woman, Narumon Chuaisombat (inset). (FB/Nontiya.dental)
The happy couple and the other woman, Narumon Chuaisombat (inset). (FB/Nontiya.dental)

Nontiya Krowjatturat's last Facebook message set off alarms that would spell fatal consequences for her only days away from her wedding.

She and her fiance, Ronnachai Panchart, 26, had scheduled their wedding for Sunday in Chumphon, her home province. But she was shot dead allegedly by Mr Ronnachai in the early hours of Tuesday. The plan, and her life, were shattered by the blast of a shotgun.

Her death, however, was not complicated to solve, according to investigators from the police station which handled the case. Police spent about five hours identifying the gunman. Footage from security cameras provided vital clues as to the physical appearance of the suspect.

But earlier clues were obtained from Nontiya's frustration ("ngud ngid mahk") she vented on her Facebook, accounts given by her father, as well as a "suspicious sounding" reply Mr Ronnachai gave police when the officers called him on the phone to deliver the bad news about his fiance's death.

According to police, investigators were taken aback by the cruel intentions behind the murder. He was to marry the woman, with whom he had been in a relationship for a long time. She discovered he had been having an affair with a younger woman who worked at the same office.

Nontiya worked as a dental health official in Tha Sae district of Chumphon.

Mr Ronnachai allegedly admitted to police during a five-hour interrogation that he killed his bride-to-be with a shotgun in the residential compound of the hospital where she worked, Chumphon police chief said the day following her death.

Mr Ronnachai, an employee of the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (Egat)'s branch in the province, told police that despite their plan to wed, he did not love her any more. He found a new love, later identified as Narumon Chuaisombat.

Mr Ronnachai said he and Nontiya had been a couple since they first met in high school several years ago.

Before arresting Mr Ronnachai, police investigators reviewed security camera footage taken from the residential compound where he allegedly shot her to death. The footage showed a hooded man entering Nontiya's living quarters before she was found dead.

The officers also presented the footage to the woman's father, Chao, to look at, hoping he would be able to help identify the hooded man. The police did not say if the father recognised the man. However, investigators said the hooded man's physical appearance closely resembled that of Mr Ronnachai.

Mr Chao also told police his daughter's relationship with Mr Ronnachai turned sour after Nontiya found out her boyfriend was seeing Ms Narumon.

This led to bitter quarrels between his daughter and Mr Ronnachai who, according to Mr Chao, beat her up during an argument.

According to police, Mr Ronnachai showed a tendency to resort to violence when provoked. After Nontiya was found dead, the police contacted Mr Ronnachai and asked if he knew she had died.

Mr Ronnachai stammered and gave a vague answer. And although lost for words, showed little concern about her fate.

A police investigator said something "major" was amiss about Mr Ronnachai's behaviour. "[His reaction] spoke much louder than words," the investigator said.

His natural, calm reaction to the bad news raised police investigators' suspicions.

Instead of heading to Nontiya's place to see her family, he chose to meet the police first. After five hours of questioning, Mr Ronnachai allegedly admitted he had pulled the trigger and shot Nontiya to death.

According to his confession, Mr Ronnachai asked Ms Narumon to drive him to the hospital during the late evening of Dec 18.

He walked to Nontiya's living quarters, after telling Narumon to turn off the car's headlight.

He pushed the security camera installed in the area in another direction before using an iron bar to break into Nontiya's room through the window.

Mr Ronnachai told police he was rummaging through her room to look for cash worth 400,000 and 10 baht weight of gold intended to be the wedding dowry. His search woke Nonitya and as he was making his escape, Nontiya chased him. He then turned to her and shot her in the chest, according to police.

Ms Narumon drove the car round to pick him up. As he made his escape, he dropped the gun into Khlong Tha Taphao in Chumphon's Tha Sae district.

The suspect claimed he had been under pressure to marry Nontiya against his will. He had to borrow almost one million baht for the wedding.

The debt left him stressed which made him decide to "end it" by taking Nontiya's life, police said after questioning Mr Ronnachai.

Police on Friday retrieved the weapon from the canal. It was the same day the court granted warrants for the arrest of Mr Ronnachai on a charge of premeditated murder of Nontiya, and for Narumon on a charge of colluding in the murder of Nontiya. The two suspects are remanded in the Chumphon Prison's custody.

Mr Ronnachai denied involvement in the murder while Ms Narumon allegedly admitted she drove Mr Ronnachai to the hospital. However, according to a police source, Ms Narumon bought a gun for Mr Ronnachai for 7,000 baht after he told her he needed the weapon for self-protection.

Learn from listening

Click play to listen to audio for this story, or download to save the file
: :

Vocabulary

  • affair: a sexual relationship between two people - ความสัมพันธ์ทางเพศ
  • allegedly: claimed to have done something wrong, but not yet proven - ที่กล่าวหา
  • amiss: likely to cause difficulties or problems - ไม่ถูกต้อง, ไม่เหมาะสม
  • beat up: to hit or kick somebody hard, many times - ตีจนบาดเจ็บอย่างรุนแรง
  • borrow: to take money from a bank, financial organisation, person, etc. and pay it back over a period of time - ยืม
  • complicated: difficult to deal with, do or understand - ซับซ้อน
  • cruel: deliberately causing pain to other people or animals - ป่าเถื่อน  โหดร้าย
  • dowry: money and/or property that, in some societies, a husband must pay to his wife's family when they get married ; money and/or property that, in some societies, a wife or her family must pay to her husband when they get married; - สินสอดทองหมั้น, สินสมรส
  • footage: film of a particular subject or event - ฟิลม์หรือคลิปภาพยนตร์
  • frustration: an annoyed or discouraged feeling because you cannot do or have what you want - ความผิดหวัง, ความไม่พอใจ
  • gunman: a hired killer; a person hired to kill with a gun; a hitman - มือปืน
  • hooded: covered with a piece of cloth that can be pulled over a person’s head and face - คลุมหัวปิดหน้า
  • identify: to recognise something and understand what it is - ชี้ ระบตัวุ
  • identify: to specify who someone is - ระบุชื่อ
  • intention: a plan in your mind to do something - ความตั้งใจ เจตนา แผนการ
  • premeditated: planned in advance - คาดคิดมาก่อน
  • quarrel: an argument or strong disagreement - การทะเลาะเบาะแว้ง
  • rummage: to search for something among a lot of other things; to move things around carelessly while searching for something - ค้นกระจุยกระจาย, รื้อค้น
  • shattered: badly damaged or destroyed - ที่เสียหายป่นปี้
  • shotgun (noun): gun that fires a lot of small metal bullets (called shot) and is used especially for shooting birds or animals - ปืนลูกซอง
  • sour (relations): to cause a relationship to have problems; to worsen relations -
  • stammer: to speak with difficulty, repeating sounds or words and often stopping, before saying things correctly - พูดตะกุกตะกัก
  • suspicious: a feeling that someone or something cannot be trusted — - มีความสงสัย, ด้วยความสงสัย, สงสัย, พิรุธ
  • tendency: likely to behave or act in a particular way - นิสัย, ท่าทาง
  • trigger: the part of a gun that you press in order to fire it - ไกปืน
  • vague: not complete, accurate or fully formed - อย่างไม่ชัดเจน
  • vent: to express your feelings of anger very strongly - แสดงออก, ปล่อยอารมณ์, ระบายอารมณ์
  • violence: physical force with the deliberate intention of causing damage to property or injury or death to people - ความรุนแรง, การใช้กำลังทำลาย
  • vital: extremely important; necessary for the success or continued existence of something - จำเป็นสำหรับชีวิต; สำคัญมาก
Do you like the content of this article?
COMMENT (1)
MORE IN SECTION