The Thailand expat forum for Travel, Lifestyle and Fun.

zubber

Phuket Tourists in Trouble Win a 'Fly Home' Deal

By Chutima Sidasathian
Friday, November 6, 2009
EXPAT tourists who find themselves in trouble are likely to gain a better deal under a new scheme outlined today by the Chief Justice of Phuket, Varangkana Sucharitakul.

Passports are likely to be returned in future and people charged with minor offences will be able to travel home - provided they mediate a quick settlement, or deposit a substantial bail sum to ensure their return.



The two alternatives should help to avoid more cases like that of Simon Burrowes, the British tourist who was trapped on Phuket for three months after swearing at the Immigration counter at Phuket airport on his way home from a holiday.

It would also apply in the case of Annice Smoel, who wanted to return to her young daughters in Australia but could not because she had been accused of stealing a beer mat at a Patong bar.

Chief Justice Varangkana has suggested that the system will work with the help of local consuls and envoys, who should be made aware as a matter of course of all cases involving expats accused of crimes.

''Like most other countries, we want to retain one law for everyone, so a special court for tourists is not going to be a possibility,'' she said today.

Since being promoted to the island's top judicial position in April, Chief Justice Varangkana has implemented a host of changes designed to make justice on Phuket work more swiftly and efficiently.

Her plan for providing help to tourists through court officials with special training should end the heartache for tourists who stray while on holiday.

In the past, as in the Burrowes case, tourists have lost jobs or suffered unwarranted punlishment for silly misdemeanors. In many cases, with passports impounded, the unreasonable financial penalties have included drawn-out accommodation costs and additional fares as relatives or lawyers or both fly in to provide assistance.

But there would still be limits. People caught with a small quantity of an illegal drug might be allowed to fly home, she said. Those caught selling drugs to others would not.

The breakthrough idea to solve an issue that has damaged the image of Thailand's tourism this year especially is another victory for Chief Justice Varangkana's common sense approach to implementing the law.

Her mediation scheme, enlarged from the concept of a predecessor, has already won several awards and taken the pressure off Phuket's court system. It has also eased the burden on the island's overcrowded jail.

Phuket now mediates more cases than any other jurisdiction in Thailand, with surprising success. Because of the mixed nature of Phuket, expats are involved in many of the disputes.

Hundreds of civil cases each month are now being settled by a system that has two mediators listen in as many as four rooms at once to all participants, and offer potential solutions.

''We will usually get everyone together,'' she said. ''Some cases are simple, others take several meetings and a lot of consideration by the parties involved.''

There is no cost. Chief Justice Varangkana is especially pleased with a case that went as high as a case can, to Thailand's Supreme Court. The dispute, between members of a family over land on Phuket, was resolved in the traditional manner, with the court ruling in favor of one party.

Rather than have a winner and a loser in a dispute that had festered within the family for 15 years, Chief Justice Varangkana sat down with both parties. Within three hours, the land had been amicably divided.

''Mediation answers many problems within the law because it reduces the number of losers and saves time and money for the court system,'' she said.

The statistics are quite remarkable, with 394 cases out of a total of 423 civil disagreements being mediated in August, a 98 percent success rate.

The sums involved are also quite staggering. The 208 civil cases that went to mediation on Phuket in October involved 119 million baht. The 105 cases in September involved 345 million baht.

Criminal cases involving attempts at mediation are relatively rare, with only 169 for the year so far, with a two-thirds success rate.

Given a little more time, perhaps the chief justice will improve that settlement statistic, too.
Phuket Tourists in Trouble Win a 'Fly Home' Deal - Phuket Wan

__________________
i'd rather have a phlebotomy than a full frontal lobotomy

Jools

The upshot of this extremely flawed plan is that the defendant will be out a huge amount of money in addition to being found guilty. It would be stupid of any such person to return, but very likely, under this arrangement, his own government would extradite him to a country where justice is not possible.

__________________
"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work....I want to achieve it by not dying."...Woody Allen

Panda

"Passports are likely to be returned in future and people charged with minor offences will be able to travel home - provided they mediate a quick settlement, or deposit a substantial bail sum to ensure their return."

Mediation would also involve some kind of a payoff as well no doubt.

Bail monies and compensation payments should be placed in a brown paper bag and handed to the chief police officer.

Tom Sawyer

Chief Justice Varangkana has suggested that the system will work with the help of local consuls and envoys, who should be made aware as a matter of course of all cases involving expats accused of crimes.

Yeah great..just like the case of the 72 year old British guy missing since July and the Phuket Consul just went public with a call for help last week? This is just another scam so the police and officers of the courts can get your bribery money and then get f*cking rid of you as fast as they can. It's better if you're gone, than here waiting around..neater. Fewer questions. Case burried - Khun Nais go shopping.

__________________
My mind is not for rent to any God or Government, There's no hope for your discontent - the changes are permanent!

andyirish57

Nothing changed then.

dirtydog

So, on a long drawn out case how many times are you expected to fly to Thailand and if you win who pays for those flights?

panama hat

Extremely efficient . . . do the math . . . go on . . .

dirtydog

Well, basic maths tells me that they failed on 2 out of every hundred on 98 percent, 400 gives me 8 failures, 23 gives me one failure almost, so 9 failures which would therefore mean 414 successfully resolved cases, something seems to be amiss with my figures? Did they execute the missing 20?

__________________

the dogcatcher

Just sounds like she's sick of the police getting all the money and she wants her cut.

panama hat

Nope, your mathematical skills are better than Thai government economist's and statistician's.

So, if they can't even get their basic maths right I'd like t see them get anything slightly more difficult right

good2bhappy

are returned

the dogcatcher

Plent of cases where bond money "goes missing"

Panda

I think you got that one wrong in the case where the farang goes back home and doesn't front the court. Which I suppose would be the cheapest option for many of them. The alternative being to fork over compensation money agreed upon in the (Thai) mediation process, or wait around in Thailand for months after the holiday is over for the case to come up and possibly face a jail sentence.

Either way it comes down to a pay off to get out of the country and avoid a possible jail sentence.

good2bhappy

^ agreed if they abscond

mtone9317

The problem remains for the tourist industry. A few people get thousands and Thailand loses millions. It's a global world. One Chief of Police somewhere gets a few thousand and the tourist industry loses millions. Now their solution is: get rid of the person making the complaint. That is MURDER, and the world will, sooner or later find out and it will double the amount of loses into the tens of millions. In a Buddhist country did someone forget about the Law of Karma? There will be consequences.

the dogcatcher

This is Thailand saying "you have broken the law and we don't want you back, but before you go can we have all the money you would have spent during subsequent holidays, please".
Garbage isn't it. The Thai authorities know that no one will return to face a court.
Perhaps we could appoint JJ to oversee this initiative. There's f all money in jets skis now days.

Panda

I cant see the mediation thing being an option in many cases where a farang gets in trouble with the law. For example, a farang gets accused of trying to steal a bar mat. Whats mediation going to achieve? In this case I would imagine bail would be set at an nominal figure with a possible further under the table payment required by the BIB to ensure a speedy exit from the country unhindered.

meepho

thai policeman -

you have commited a crime and it will cost you 50.000bht in bail bond,

Tourist -

what can i do

thai policeman -

give me 10.000bht and fook of home sharpish.


yeah i can see this being a really good idea. god bless the thais

the dogcatcher

Yeah, they are sick of police getting the money. The worst thing to do is call your Embassy, they pretty much ensure you get banged up.

klongmaster

seems totally fair to me Panda:..maybe the Ocker will think twice about taking something that doesn't belong to her next time...