Unequal justice system favours conflict

Unequal justice system favours conflict

Rights defenders gather at the Royal Thai Police in July last year to demand that the authorities find and arrest the men who assaulted activist Sirawith Seritiwat.
Rights defenders gather at the Royal Thai Police in July last year to demand that the authorities find and arrest the men who assaulted activist Sirawith Seritiwat.

On June 28 last year, four men stepped off two motorcycles near an intersection in the Bangkok suburb of Min Buri. They approached a young man in a white shirt with baseball bats in hand and began to beat him, leaving him with severe injuries, before speeding off on their vehicles.

The young man was Sirawith Seritiwat, a well-known student activist better known to his friends and the media as "Ja New".

After the incident, the police issued their standard statement, promising to conduct an investigation with diligence to ensure justice was served.

The crime took place in broad daylight and was captured by security cameras in the area.

On Thursday, Mr Sirawith revealed in a Facebook post that the Min Buri police had informed him in a letter that the prosecutor in the case had decided to cease the investigation because they are unable to identify the perpetrators from images taken from the security cameras.

The news was a disappointment to Mr Sirawith as well as people following the case with interest. But it didn't come as a total surprise.

To me, the only surprise is that the prosecutor and the police could not come up with a more convincing excuse.

Only a few days after Mr Sirawith's attack, security cameras in front of Government House captured images of two motorcyclists doing stunts and making loud noises, creating a public nuisance.

The incident took place at night and the riders had helmets on. Yet, the police were able to identify and arrest the perpetrators within two days.

There's a general public perception that the Thai police are incompetent. But that's an exaggeration. The police can be very competent when they want to be. Sometimes, they are miraculously able to solve very difficult cases.

It's probably more accurate to say they are discriminatory in applying their competency. Their competence often takes a dive when having to deal with people of influence or politically charged cases.

Ekachai Hongkangwan can attest to this tendency of the police. Mr Ekachai is an anti-junta activist and over the course of less than two years, he has been attacked at least nine times.

In seven of these occasions, he was physically assaulted while his car was set on fire twice. One time, someone even threw smelly pla ra (fermented fish) sauce at him.

The police were able to apprehend the perpetrators in only two cases but only because the crime took place where officers were nearby. In one of the cases, the accused received a fine while in the other case, the perpetrator was slapped with a fine and a light jail sentence.

Another high-profile case involves the shooting of a hilltribe teenager by a soldier at a highland checkpoint in Chiang Mai on March 17, 2017.

A 17-year-old Lahu hilltribe boy, Chaiyaphum Pasae, was stopped at the checkpoint. Eyewitnesses said a soldier pulled him out of the car he was driving and started beating him up.

Chaiyaphum attempted to flee and was shot in the back. The military alleged that drugs were found in his car and that the soldier was forced to shoot him in self-defence as he was about to throw a grenade at the checkpoint.

Several security cameras in the area were apparently in working order because both the regional military commander and the army commander claimed they had seen the video recording of the incident and it confirmed the extrajudicial killing was self-defence.

Chaiyaphum's killing generated widespread public interest and sympathy because the officials' version of the incident kept changing and they were slow to submit the evidence to the police. And when they did submit the evidence, it turned out to be … nothing.

The investigation, which crept along at a snail's pace, eventually came to a dead-end after the police said they didn't have the video evidence. The military said it had turned over the hard disk to the police and now that part of the disk containing the recording has been recorded over.

In other words, that crucial evidence is gone. The case now comes down to the words of villager witnesses against those of the military authorities. The legal outcome of such a scenario is not hard to predict.

Since the 2014 military coup, intimidation has been the regime's tool of choice to silence dissenters. If intimidation by law doesn't do the trick, intimidation by violence often produces the desired result, even if temporarily.

In a way, the police are a victim themselves. Being the front line of the justice system, they often find themselves in the spotlight, having to handle political hot potatoes and fend off public scepticism and criticism.

Historically subservient to the military, the police must thread a very thin line in cases involving the military.

Having said that, it is no excuse for them to not serve the cause of justice as demanded by their oath of office. Inaction and obfuscation put their dignity in peril.

However, the police are just one part of the justice system, which has been increasingly seen in a negative light, particularly after the 2006 coup that reinstalled the military as the supreme power.

But an unjust system in a society that has tasted liberty and freedom in the past cannot be sustained for long. Whatever hope for a peaceful existence for the nation will never see the light of day.

Simply put, if there's no justice, there can be no peace.

Wasant Techawongtham

Freelance Reporter

Freelance Reporter and Managing Editor of Milky Way Press.

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