Update: Police later held a press conference to confirm all the details already released in the report below. Through a press release, police confirmed that the two men had been paid B11,000: B1,000 for each of the 10 buses damaged, plus B1,000 “gratuity”.
Police also confirmed that the men were paid by a tour bus operator in Phuket Province, named by police only as ’Goh M’, who offered the men B1,000 for damaging buses belonging to any of three companies: Chalermphat Co Ltd, First Transport Co Ltd and Andaman Lotus Co Ltd.
According to a report by Phuket Info Center, the two men were arrested on a warrant issued by Phuket Provincial Court on Monday (Nov 13).
At 2pm on Tuesday (Nov 14), officers from the Wichit Police, Phuket City Police, Chalong Police and an investigation team from the Phuket Provincial Police working together with investigators from Region 8 Police moved in and made the arrests, Phuket Info Center reported.
The report named the suspects arrested as Mr Panupong, or ‘Noon’, (family name not reported), a 34-year-old resident of Soi Samakkhi 2, off Yaowarat Rd, in Phuket Town, and and ‘Mr Sarayut’ (family name not reported), 29, from Pattani.
The men were arrested at a house in Moo 3, Wichit, and at a bus parking area on Soi Luang Phor Kluea, in Moo 3, Wichit.
Officers seized as evidence two motorbikes used in carrying out the attacks, as well as two slingshots and 72 steel balls used to shoot bus windows.
The two men were taken in for questioning, and face charges of causing damage to private property as well as collaborating to cause damage to public transportation vehicles in a manner that is likely to cause danger to persons, the Phuket Info Center confirmed.
According to the report, the two men confessed that they used a slingshot loaded with steel balls to shoot the windows of 10 transport buses in three separate attacks.
Two buses were damaged at the Shell gas station on Thepkrasattri Rd in Sapam, Ratsada, on Oct 26.
Two more buses were damaged at a tour bus parking area near the SuperCheap store on Soi Palai, Chalong, on Nov 2.
Four more buses were damaged at a tour bus parking area opposite Wat Chalong last Saturday (Nov 11).
The men told police they had been hired to carry out the attacks, and were paid B1,000 for each bus they damaged.
Police are continuing their investigation to apprehend the person who funded the attacks, the report said.
A report by Thai-language ‘Manager Online’ on Nov 3 quoted Phuket City Police Chief Pol Col Pratuang Pholmana as leading a team of forensic police to investigate the buses damaged in the attacks so far at that time.
Both reports featured photos of police carrying out their inspections of the damaged tour buses, namely buses emblazoned with the log of the the popular Russian tour agency ’Anex Tour’.
However, so far [at time of press] not one of the four police stations reported as involved and quoted in the reports by Phuket Info Center and Manager Online ‒ not the Phuket City Police, Region 8 Police, Chalong Police or Wichit Police ‒ have publicly posted any reports recognising the attacks.