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Probably the wrong forum, but this brings closure to some old news. I am not too sure I am digging my place being called a "haven for misfits and perverts"
Canadian's arrest ends three-year globalmanhunt
Ed Cropley and Nopporn Wong-Anan, with Files From Kim Bolan, CanWest News Service , Reuters, with Files From CanWest News Service
Published: Saturday, October 20, 2007
BANGKOK - After a three-year hunt involving cutting-edge technology and police on three continents, it was dogged detective work and a Thai transvestite that finally led officers to Canadian pedophile suspect Christopher Neil.
Thai police Colonel Paisal Luesomboon, who arrested Mr. Neil in the dusty town of Nakhon Ratchasima, 250 kilometres northeast of Bangkok, said the 32-year-old knew the game was up and surrendered without a struggle. "He said he knew he was on an Interpol arrest warrant," he said.
His companion at the time of his arrest was a 25-year-old "katoey" -- the Thai word for transvestite or transsexual -- a friendship that proved key to the manhunt.
After an alert from Interpol, police Lieutenant-Colonel Phanthana Nutchanart sent his men to trawl transvestite hangouts in Bangkok's Patpong red-light district and the seaside town of Pattaya, infamous as a haven for misfits and perverts.
After seeing a picture of Mr. Neil taken by security cameras on his arrival at Bangkok airport a week ago, transvestites in Pattaya said they had seen him with a 25-year-old cross-dresser called Ohm. But the pair had already fled the eastern seaboard town, dubbed "The Old Whore of Asia" since the days of the Vietnam War, when American GIs would come in their thousands in search of euphemistically phrased "R&R".
Police traced Ohm's real name on Thailand's national citizens database, found he came from the province of Chaiyaphume and -- crucially -- got his phone number. They started going through his phone records, allowing them to chart the pair's progress from Pattaya to Chaiyaphume and ultimately Nakhon Ratchasima.
The last number dialled on Ohm's phone was to a friend in Nakhon Ratchasima, who eventually told police Ohm was trying to rent a house in the province and passed on the address. It was a low-tech end to a manhunt that started three years ago in Germany, when child-crime officers found images on the Internet of a man raping young boys in Vietnam and Cambodia. The man's face was digitally "swirled" but officers in Germany's BKA federal crime office unscrambled the image with cutting-edge technology.
Yesterday, the RCMP said a number of tips had been received about Mr. Neil, but there was no separate criminal investigation into the Maple Ridge native's activities in B.C.
Canadian's arrest ends three-year globalmanhunt
Ed Cropley and Nopporn Wong-Anan, with Files From Kim Bolan, CanWest News Service , Reuters, with Files From CanWest News Service
Published: Saturday, October 20, 2007
BANGKOK - After a three-year hunt involving cutting-edge technology and police on three continents, it was dogged detective work and a Thai transvestite that finally led officers to Canadian pedophile suspect Christopher Neil.
Thai police Colonel Paisal Luesomboon, who arrested Mr. Neil in the dusty town of Nakhon Ratchasima, 250 kilometres northeast of Bangkok, said the 32-year-old knew the game was up and surrendered without a struggle. "He said he knew he was on an Interpol arrest warrant," he said.
His companion at the time of his arrest was a 25-year-old "katoey" -- the Thai word for transvestite or transsexual -- a friendship that proved key to the manhunt.
After an alert from Interpol, police Lieutenant-Colonel Phanthana Nutchanart sent his men to trawl transvestite hangouts in Bangkok's Patpong red-light district and the seaside town of Pattaya, infamous as a haven for misfits and perverts.
After seeing a picture of Mr. Neil taken by security cameras on his arrival at Bangkok airport a week ago, transvestites in Pattaya said they had seen him with a 25-year-old cross-dresser called Ohm. But the pair had already fled the eastern seaboard town, dubbed "The Old Whore of Asia" since the days of the Vietnam War, when American GIs would come in their thousands in search of euphemistically phrased "R&R".
Police traced Ohm's real name on Thailand's national citizens database, found he came from the province of Chaiyaphume and -- crucially -- got his phone number. They started going through his phone records, allowing them to chart the pair's progress from Pattaya to Chaiyaphume and ultimately Nakhon Ratchasima.
The last number dialled on Ohm's phone was to a friend in Nakhon Ratchasima, who eventually told police Ohm was trying to rent a house in the province and passed on the address. It was a low-tech end to a manhunt that started three years ago in Germany, when child-crime officers found images on the Internet of a man raping young boys in Vietnam and Cambodia. The man's face was digitally "swirled" but officers in Germany's BKA federal crime office unscrambled the image with cutting-edge technology.
Yesterday, the RCMP said a number of tips had been received about Mr. Neil, but there was no separate criminal investigation into the Maple Ridge native's activities in B.C.
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