Thread: Phi Phi : Canadian sisters found dead in Thai resort

Quebec sisters may have died from accidental poisoning: Thai police | News | National Post

Quebec sisters may have died from accidental poisoning: Thai police

Jeff Heinrich and Paul Delean, Postmedia News
Jun 17, 2012 – 6:40 PM ET


mcot.net
Passport photos of Noemi, left, and Audrey Belanger, who where found dead Thursday at the Phi Phi Palm Residence Hotel.

MONTREAL — The two Quebec women found dead Thursday night in a hotel room on Phi Phi Island in southern Thailand do not appear to have been murdered, police said Sunday.

Instead, accidental poisoning may have caused the death of Noemi Belanger, 26, and her sister Audrey Belanger, 20, at the Phi Phi Palm Residence Hotel.

An analysis of their stomach contents will help determine the true cause.

The sisters were well known and popular in their hometown Pohenegamook, Que., a rural community of about 3,000 near the border with Maine, the local mayor said.

“They were two brilliant young girls, very involved in the community,” Mayor Louise Labonte said Saturday.

She said they were always active in town events and worked in a grocery store owned by their father, Carl.

She said the sisters attended the local high school, Ecole secondaire du Transcontinental, where Labonte was a librarian. The school has about 250 students.

The young women were studying at Universite Laval.

Carl and his wife, Linda, have an older daughter, Elena, she said.

“This must be so hard for them,” said an emotional Labonte. “We’ll support them any way we can.”

Claudette Levasseur, a waitress at Restaurant du Moulin, said Noemi worked for her when she was in charge of the municipal beach.

“She was always smiling, in good humour. They were both energetic, helpful. Everyone here is shaken. It’s given us all a chill.”

The Belanger sisters were found in their room by a hotel maid. Both had been dead for about 24 hours, police said. There was blood on the women’s faces and a lot of vomit in the room — possible signs of a toxic reaction.

There were no signs of robbery or a fight.

The deaths evoke two similar and unsolved deaths three years ago on the same resort island, when two women, an American and a Norwegian, were found poisoned in their adjoining rooms. There were signs of vomiting. Their boyfriends also became ill but survived.

The island is a popular holiday spot for young people where bars stay open until dawn and binge drinking out of “buckets” is said to be a popular pastime.

Claude Rochon of the Department of Foreign Affairs media office in Ottawa refused to disclose any information other than to say, “our thoughts are with the family and friends of the Canadian citizens who passed away in Thailand.”

She added that “Canadian consular officials in Bangkok are providing consular assistance to the family and are in contact with local authorities.”

According to the Thai newspaper Phuket Gazette, the sisters checked into the hotel Tuesday.

They planned to stay only one night but later asked to extend their visit through Wednesday night.

The paper quotes one Thai police officer saying that the sisters arrived at the hotel Tuesday and “went out and came back to their room that same night, but stayed in their room all day on Wednesday.”

The sisters were found Thursday after a maid became concerned that they were not responding to her knocks.

“A maid knocked on the door to clean the room on Thursday, but there was no response, so the maid thought the women needed more rest and left,” a police officer said.

Thursday evening the maid tried again. When she got no response, she grew concerned and used a master key to enter the room, where she discovered the bodies. The hotel alerted police at 9 p.m.

“We rushed to the hotel with medical officers from Koh Phi Phi Hospital and a rescue team,” police told the newspaper.

Police also said the young women had skin lesions, had been bleeding from the gums and their fingernails and toenails were blue.

Police told the newspaper that the women died 12 to 20 hours before their bodies were found.

Isabelle Soucy, a high school art teacher who taught both girls when they were students at Ecole secondaire du Transcontinental, said that whole town is badly shaken up by the deaths. The Belanger family, which includes an older sister, is well known and well loved in the small town, Soucy said.

“They were very engaged, social girls, really good girls. This really touches everyone here so deeply,“ Soucy said.

While Audrey had just begun an undergraduate degree at Universite Laval, Noemi had completed a degree in psychology and had just been accepted in Laval’s school of dentistry. The girls apparently were taking a short holiday in Thailand to celebrate the school year ending, before returning to Pohenegamook for the summer, as usual, to work in their father’s grocery store.

“They are a very strong, close family who often travel together,” said Soucy, noting a recent trip to New York City by the parents and three sisters. She said Noemie also had travelled to several developing countries to do humanitarian work.

“I don’t understand what happened. It seems from the television news that the hotel they were staying at was a nice hotel, not a dump. I don’t understand if they were sick why they didn’t ask for help. They are girls who know how to look after themselves, they can speak French and English . . . I just don’t understand why it happened so fast and why nobody else was sick,” at the hotel, she said.

Originally Posted by guyinthailand

Originally Posted by BobR

In both that incident and this, they would do themselves a lot less damage by being honest and forthright.

Don't worry, we're moments away from the Thai lies and spin to start on this story, just as it did with the previous Phi Phi and Chiang Mai victims.

Originally Posted by BobR

In both that incident and this, they would do themselves a lot less damage by being honest and forthright.

Don't worry, we're moments away from the Thai lies and spin to start on this story, just as it did with the previous Phi Phi and Chiang Mai victims.


Ah, here it is! Ibuprofen is a suspect!

“There was neither signs of fighting, nor robbery, but we found many kinds of over-the-counter drugs, including ibuprofen, which can cause serious effects on the stomach,” he said, after a team of investigators combed through the hotel room on Sunday", said police Lt. Col. Jongrak Pimthong.
Audrey And Noemi Belanger Dead: Accidental Poisoning Possibly Behind Death Of Canadian Sisters

The sheer amateurishness of the authorities in these cases does not help their cause.

Quite how the police can speculate as to whether or not a crime has occurred without a detailed forensic analysis of the scene and autopsy is beyond belief.

Who actually examined the bodies and determined the victims had bleeding from the gums and skin lesions? Was it a specialist pathologist or an unqualified medic and the local police officer? What do they mean by lesions? Were the fingernails blue or were they black?

If they were both unable to call for assistance during their extremis then one must reasonably conclude whatever they ingested that caused them to vomit simultaneously and fall unconscious must have been taken contemporaneously and was so virulent as to render them more or less immediately helpless.

As the Phuketwan piece rightly observes, these islands and coastal resorts are nothing more than faux paradises floating on a raft of effluence. God only knows what pathogens are created in the heat and filth of an overflowing cesspit but if a food or water source has become contaminated then illness is bound to ensue. One suspects the locals know this but to what extent chemicals are introduced by them into the environment to combat what they perceive to be a threat is unknown. I can't recall the name of the poor woman but a British woman visiting her daughter in Phi Phi/Krabi fell ill upon her return to the UK and was immediately hospitalised. Despite their best ministrations she died from the effects of a massive bacterial infection. Her daughter said her mother had had to wade through raw effluent when their pathway to their hotel room was flooded and a previous cut to her leg may have become infected.

Did they consume contaminated magic mushrooms? Or did they drink contaminated water? Were they poisoned by chemicals by accident or by design? Who knows but one thing is for sure, the Thai investigation will be riven by incompetence and criminal stupidity.

Mushrooms, contaminated water, 'regular' chemicals, bacteria, Dengue fever, food poisoning etc do not cause bleeding from the gums.

But rat poison, (warfarin, coumadin, etc) does, reliably. Plus vomiting and bruising.

Until proven otherwise, murder by rat poison.

raw sewage running down the soi's is common this time of the year and the amount of rain we have had, I think rains more then it does in Phuket.

First Ibuprofen, now this

Dr Komgrib said he and Phi Phi hospital director Duangporn Paothong had jointly examined the dead bodies of the tourists and found they had suffered no physical injuries. It was too soon to pinpoint the cause of the deaths, he said, adding that bleeding gums and bleeding under the skin were not always linked to poisoning.
Such symptoms are usually found on diseased people, the doctor said.
Police baffled over death of sisters

Originally Posted by guyinthailand

Mushrooms, contaminated water, 'regular' chemicals, bacteria, Dengue fever, food poisoning etc do not cause bleeding from the gums.

But rat poison, (warfarin, coumadin, etc) does, reliably. Plus vomiting and bruising.

Until proven otherwise, murder by rat poison.

Oh dear, which bit of my post did you not understand?

Let's try again. Where does your information come from that the victims displayed symptoms of bleeding gums? Was it Sgt Somchai, Pol Lt Gen. Big Bollox, the medic in situ or the hack doctor who happened to be about or was it from a qualified pathologist at the pinnacle of their profession after hours of toxicology tests, examination of internal organs and a thorough examination of the bodies taking into account their medical histories?

Tell me, Sherlock, how does one tell from a cursory examination of the bodies in situ that blood found in their mouths was from bleeding gums and not retched from the abdomen or even from the consequence of a human being biting their own tongue, inner cheek or inner lips in the course of a seizure?

It may well be they were poisoned but the point is, conjecture on third hand information emanating from lay people is utterly worthless.

Yeah, the police gave us the 'bleeding gums' info to throw us off the true path.

You are clearly a very stupid person.

Originally Posted by guyinthailand

It was murder by rat poison until proven otherwise.

Do you have a PHD in forensic Science Guy ?
You have mentioned Rat Poisoning about 10 times now. You seem to know more than a lot of specialists out there, or think you do.

Wouldn't the Warfarin have showed up by now in the Lab reports ?

Yep , he's baaaaaaack.

Our serial poisoner, and visine is the culprit I am quite sure, not rat poison, not cassava ,not spray pesticides.. with out going through all the prior speculations on the Phi Phi and Chiang Mai threads
and he is targeting young attractive western women.

^^I should imagine he thinks if he repeats it enough times in this case and in all the others that might arise in the future he may well be proved right in much the same way if one were to give a monkey enough time at a computer keyboard it might bash out Hamlet's soliloquy.

I'm all in favour of 'Cyanide Poisoning".

Blue fingernails is represented primarily by a type of cyanosis. It occurs when blood oxygen levels go below normal. The red blood cells are starved of oxygen which gradually changes the color of nails to blue. It can also be caused due to presence of abnormal hemoglobin, i.e. methemoglobin or cyanide poisoning in blood.

Blue Fingernails

Sorry Itnt

There was absolutely no C o D determined then and this is speculation you are posting as fact. Please post that data you refer to .

Originally Posted by ltnt

Two years ago the same thing happened in the same location. Chlorine gas from the water treatment plant nearby. At that time as I recall there were 4 total dead in two different locations. Nothing ever reported after that.

Thread on BP about multiple ferang deaths in Thailand has that data.

Cyanosis is also caused by death , simple lack of oxygen.

This time no fucking excuses - full toxicology and autopsies, NOW !!!!

And start searching if at all possible , since every foreigner's whereabouts in Thailand should be known and recorded, ( right ? ) for the same male in the same locations at the same time and add Koh Samet in Jan 2005 where I suffered the same symptoms.

Originally Posted by superman

I'm all in favour of 'Cyanide Poisoning".

Blue fingernails is represented primarily by a type of cyanosis. It occurs when blood oxygen levels go below normal. The red blood cells are starved of oxygen which gradually changes the color of nails to blue. It can also be caused due to presence of abnormal hemoglobin, i.e. methemoglobin or cyanide poisoning in blood.

Blue Fingernails

In May 2009 cyanide was found in one of the women that died then, but wasn't found later. Cyanide actually disappears over a period of time naturally. I'll stick with 'cyanide poisoning'.

Just saw the first report about thse girls in a Canadian news outlet.

They were from the French part of Canada, Quebec.

The report didn't say anymore other than what the police said here, just wondering why only these two girls in this hotel, and no-one else.

^^ # 73

Oh dear here we go again, and again,... and again .. I beg to differ,
Not cyanide but cyanosis and I posted on it then how the syndrome of blue nails known as cyanosis was confused with cyanide poisoning. Probably one of Phuket Wan's typical slop reports.
The problem is not one of these deaths has been autopsied properly.