A police lieutenant colonel was yesterday dismissed from the force for allegedly demanding 100,000 baht and sex from a woman motorist in exchange for dropping a charge of trespassing after her car broke down one night in Saraburi province.
The woman, whose name was withheld, had sought help from social media advocate Kanthat Pongpaiboonvej, alias Kan Chompalang, who took her to file an initial complaint in Saraburi and then with deputy national police chief Pol Gen Surachate Hakparn.
The woman said she had been driving home one night last October when her car developed a problem, and the battery went flat, leaving her stranded in the vehicle by the side of the road.
A man had pulled up offering help and towed her car to a house in an isolated street. He told her he would get a gallon container to buy petrol. As her mobile phone's battery had also run out, she asked to borrow a charger.
He told her to get it from inside a room. When she entered the room, he immediately locked the door and tried to sexually molest her.
She evaded his advances by asking to use the bathroom and then fled from there, climbing over a fence into a neighbouring property. The owner of that house then filed a complaint after seeing the woman trespassing.
She was taken to a police station to face the trespassing charge, and while there she also filed a charge of sexual molestation against the owner of the first house, who had initially come to her rescue.
A police lieutenant colonel later approached her and said he could help in exchange for 100,000 baht for not taking the case to prosecutors. She negotiated it down to 10,000 baht before the officer demanded to have sex with her, too, she said.
Pol Maj Gen Wichit Boonchinnawutthikul, chief of Saraburi police, who also questioned the victim, said yesterday that the accused lieutenant colonel had been previously found guilty by a panel of fraud on the job and a final decision over his dismissal was already pending.