Tour bus driver caught stealing from tourists' bags

Tour bus driver caught stealing from tourists' bags

Tour bus driver Wasant Phonthonglang, 36, confesses to having stolen items from the luggage of five Chinese passengers, during police interrogation on Monday. (Photo by Sutthiwit Chayutworakan)
Tour bus driver Wasant Phonthonglang, 36, confesses to having stolen items from the luggage of five Chinese passengers, during police interrogation on Monday. (Photo by Sutthiwit Chayutworakan)

SAMUT PRAKAN: A tour bus driver has been charged with stealing valuables and other items worth 60,000 baht in total from five Chinese passengers whose travel bags were forced open while they visited tourist attractions.

Wasant Phonthonglang, 36, was apprehended on Monday and taken to a media briefing at Suvannabhumi airport.

Pol Maj Gen Surachate Hakparn, deputy chief of the Tourist Police Bureau, said five Chinese nationals filed a complaint with tourist police at the airport about 10pm on Saturday that someone had stolen several valuable items and belongings from their travel bags.

They told police they had arrived in Thailand with a tour group on May 15 and were scheduled to return home on May 19.

When they collected their bags after arriving back at the airport on Saturday they noticed the wheels were damaged. They looked closer and found marks showing their bags had been pried open. They checked the contents and found several valuable items and other things were missing. The stolen items were worth about 60,000 baht in total.

Police called Mr Wasant in for questioning and he later confessed to having stolen the tourists’ belongings. He said he used a multi-purpose screw driver to pry open the bags when his passengers got off the bus for sight-seeing and shopping. He hid the stolen items in some roadside bushes.

He took the officers to the place, where they found the missing items. 

The tour bus driver has been charged with theft. The stolen items were handed over to the tour firm to be returned to the five Chinese tourists.

Stolen items retrieved from the roadside bushes where they were hidden by the tour bus driver. (Photo by Sutthiwit Chayutworakan)

A police chart outlines the theft of the tourists' possessions from their bags by the tour bus driver. (Photo by Sutthiwit Chayutworakan)


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