A 31-year-old fugitive was arrested in Nonthaburi province early on Wednesday and charged with repeatedly stabbing and then cutting the throat of his girlfriend, a kindergarten teacher, in Songkhla's Hat Yai district in July in 2011.
Songkhla native Setthawut Poonsiriratanakul was apprehended in front of Popular Condo Building 1 in the Muang Thong Thani estate in Pak Kret district of Nonthaburi shortly after midnight.
He was wanted for murder, named in an arrest warrant issued by the Songkhla provincial court on July 29, 2011.
Pol Col Arun Wachirasrisukanya of the Crime Suppression Division said Mr Setthawut is charged with killing Sunicha Inchuay, 27, at a resort in Hat Yai municipality on July 26, 2011. She was found dead in their rented room's bathroom, with multiple stab wounds to the body and her throat cut open.
The victim had arrived at the resort hotel, accompanied by a man, in a black BMW car registered in her name in Bangkok, about 5pm on July 25, 2011.
The couple went out that night and returned about 2am on July 26. Hotel staff called their room at noon, but no one answered. Her body was found when the room was opened.
Mr Setthawut allegedly confessed that he had quarrelled with the woman on returning to the room, because he suspected her of luring him into meeting her new boyfriend, who could have hurt him. So he used a knife he carried to kill her and then drove away from the hotel in her car.
Pol Col Arun quoted the victim's relatives as saying they had been in a relationship for three years. During that time he had used drugs and been violent. She had tried unsuccessfully to break up with him.
The woman had on four occasions filed complaints with Hat Yai police, alleging physical abuse, before she was slain.