The Justice Ministry's Central Institute of Forensic Science (CIFS) found no trace of assault on the body of a two-year-old Myanmar boy found dead on Tuesday in a sugarcane field in Suphan Buri province, while the suspect, who has Down's syndrome, has been charged with deprivation of a minor from parental care.
Worawee Waiyawut, director of the DNA Division at the CIFS, confirmed previous examination results that no signs of polio were found in an autopsy. There were traces of post-mortem animal bites, but no trace of assault.
"The autopsy results by the CIFS correspond with the results of a previous autopsy conducted on the boy's body by the Police General Hospital's Institute of Forensic Medicine," he said.
The assertion made on Friday by the CIFS refuted a remark by the boy's parents that Salui Piew, aka Ta-ngae, had polio and that it was highly unlikely the boy could walk on his own for over 800 metres to where his dead body was found.
The parents, Piew, 26, a migrant worker and his wife Mor, 20, earlier questioned the results of the first autopsy at the Police General Hospital's Institute of Forensic Medicine, which showed no sign of physical assault. The autopsy results meant the suspect, a man identified as Fon, was off the hook for assault or murder.
Pol Maj Gen Khomsak Sumangkhakaset, chief of Suphan Buri police, told reporters on Saturday the investigation found Mr Fon, who wanted to play with the boy, had only held Ta-ngae's arm when he took the boy for a walk on a road in the sugarcane plantation. The boy, however, ran away and fell into a ditch where his body was later found, said Pol Maj Gen Khomsak. Mr Fon didn't help the drowning boy from the ditch because he was afraid he would drown too, said Pol Maj Gen Khomsak.
The court will decide if he will be punished on the charge, said Pol Maj Gen Khomsak. The autopsy results will next be forwarded to police investigators handling the case and the family of the boy, he added.