The news made international headlines, notably after a Facebook post by the toilet attendant’s father called for people to help find the foreigner – and marked that his son was “more than 10 years old…”
His son, Abdulloh Saesaheh, however, is 20 years old. (See story here.)
Patong Police, who said on Wednesday last week (May 17) that they were looking for Mr Abdulloh’s attacker, told The Phuket News yesterday (May 25) that was no longer the case.
“We took information down to record as evidence, because (Patong Police) are interested in all incidents that are not right or appropriate,” said Maj Gornpon Liangboonjinda of the Patong Police.
“But we are not investigating the case now. There has been no formal complaint filed,” he said.
Tohee Saesaheh, who confirmed he was Abdulloh’s father, told The Phuket News, “We are convinced (the attacker) most likely went back to his home country a while ago. But if anything comes up, we will get police to follow it.
“People think that he took photos of the women. This is false and nothing of the sort happened. We checked CCTV and there is no evidence to support that (Abdulloh) had been doing any of them any wrong. He was just sitting when the foreigner confronted him in a bad temper,” Mr Tohee said.
Asked if his son offered any suggestions as to why he was attacked, Mr Tohee said, “No, but he could not understand what the man was saying. That is why in the video you can see him trying to use his phone.”
Asked about initial reports that Mr Abdulloh was 10 years old, Mr Tohee explained, “I asked a friend of mine to put the video up on Facebook and he was the one who wrote the caption. He was guessing Abdulloh’s age to be 16 or 17, so he wrote sip gwa pee (Thai for ‘mid-tens’). People then understood from it that he is 10.
“I took the Facebook account down because the police already have the video as evidence. There is no need to keep it online. Also many people (message and comment) assuming things that are wrong,” he added.