Clerk held for 'taking funds'

A subdistrict administration clerk in Nakhon Sawan has been arrested by Anti-Corruption Division (ACD) police for allegedly embezzling more than 15 million baht from her office's finance department.

Patchara Prasithikam, 41, a clerk with tambon Lat Yao's accounting department, was arrested yesterday in a meeting room at her office, ACD commander, Pol Maj Gen Jaroonkiat Pankaew said.

She was under investigation after the administration detected an unusually high number of withdrawals from its bank account between Jan 26 last year and Jan 17 this year. In total, 215 withdrawals were made, with about 15.8 million baht taken from the account.

ACD police found that the missing money had been withdrawn by Ms Patchara for her personal use. She was able to withdraw the money as she had the PIN code for the bank account.

Police will search the suspect's home to look for more evidence. Three witnesses had been summoned to make statements in connection with the withdrawals.

Ms Patchara told police she used the money to repay loans she took out to cover online gambling debts. She claimed the lenders threatened her whenever she had difficulty paying back the money.

She said she committed the offences alone, and nobody else, including her husband and colleagues, was involved.

Pol Lt Col Siriong Sritula, regional director of the Public Sector Anti-Corruption Commission, said over 200 million baht had been siphoned from finance offices at various local administrations throughout the country.