Thread: Thai Court Sentences Aussie /Thai Couple to Death For Drug Smuggling.

A Perth member of the notorious bikie group Hells Angels and his wife have been sentenced to death in Thailand for trying to smuggle half a tonne of crystal methamphetamine into Australia.


Luke Cook, 34, and his Thai wife Kanyarat Wechapitak, 40, were arrested at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi airport last December and charged in relation to a 2015 plot to smuggle an estimated $300 million of crystal meth - or ice - into Thailand and then on to Australia.


A Thai court has sentenced the couple to death, but that is expected to be commuted to life in prison, media reports on Wednesday said.


https://www.9news.com.au/2018/11/14/...eath-for-drugs

bwahahahahaha, sucks to be them.

Originally Posted by Luigi

were arrested at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi airport last December and charged in relation to a 2015 plot to smuggle an estimated $300 million of crystal meth - or ice - into Thailand and then on to Australia.

So - if I read that right, they tried to smuggle the drugs in 2015 which somehow must have gone tits up, and then they decided to come back to Thailand last year?


Blimey.

^Yep. Some of the yacht's consignment got washed up on a beach in Rayong back in 2015:

Cook is accused of co-ordinating the movement of the drugs from China to Thailand on board a yacht.
However the shipment was dumped off the southeastern Thai province of Chonburi after being spotted by Thai authorities, News Ltd reported.
About 50kg of the drug divided up into four sacks later washed ashore at Mae Ramphueng beach in Rayong province in June 2015.

Crystal meth, money laundering, people smuggling, etc. The Hells Angels these days are a bigger crime outfit than the Mafia.

Hope they serve their time in a Thai Gaol.

I have absolutely no sympathy for these two idiots and I hope they rot in jail due to their greed and stupidity.

But once again if illicit drugs were deemed legal and controlled and distributed by government bodies these instances would not happen and taxpayers money would be saved.

Not to mention the billions of dollars which could be channelled through worthwhile public support schemes.

When are these foolish politicians going to realise they are losing a war they can never win.

Originally Posted by Loy Toy

When are these foolish politicians going to realise they are losing a war they can never win.

In Thailand's case, I am sure they already know, but the money is too good to turn down.

Love to know what evidence the Thai police actually had as absolutely no details have emerged so we will just have to take their word for it I suppose. But as always

As part of their investigation, Thai police confiscated assets including luxury cars

A Perth father turned Hells Angels bikie and drugs trafficker and his wife have been sentenced to death in Thailand over a failed bid to smuggle half a tonne of crystal meth-amphetamine through the country to Australia.


Luke Joshua Cook, 35, and his Thai wife Kanyarat Wechapitak were arrested in December at Bangkok International Airport when he returned on a flight from Australia after local police linked him to a plot to import meth into Thailand two years earlier.


The Thai courts sentenced the pair to death for the plan to traffic the crystal meth, also known as ice, with an estimated street value of $300 million. Their sentences are expected to be commuted to life in jail.




Assets linked to the pair worth $800,000 including property, cash and cars are to be forfeited.


Veneer of boats, bars and baht fell apart in Thailand for Perth man Luke Cook


Cook, who is believed to have two children, was born in Duncraig in 1983 and spent part of his childhood in New Zealand and Papua New Guinea before returning to WA as a teenager.


According to a CV he posted on LinkedIn, from mid-2003 he spent several years working as a chef in fly-in, fly-out positions around WA including on a fishing boat and at mine sites, as well as at the Christmas Island immigration detention centre.


After meeting his future wife online, he moved to Thailand where he bought a bar in the beach resort town of Pattaya, set up a business importing boats and marine parts and joined the Pattaya branch of the Hells Angels.


Police said that in 2015, Cook took a yacht into international waters off the Thai coast to collect 500kg of meth from a Chinese trawler.


The illicit cargo was dumped overboard after the Thai Coast Guard came across the boat on its way back to port.


Although the patrol boat saw a man throwing bags over the side, he escaped in the dim, early-morning light.


Four sacks containing about 50kg of the meth were found washed ashore on Mae Ramphueng Beach in Rayong province.


Thai authorities said Cook was given $15 million by high-ranking Australian Hells Angels bikie Wayne Schneider to buy and store the drugs for later shipment to Australia.


After the failed delivery, Schneider — a fugitive who was wanted in Australia on multiple warrants and was deemed at the time to be the biggest importer of narcotics into Australia — demanded his money back.


He was murdered in November 2015 by members of his gang, his naked and mutilated body found in a shallow grave by the side of a road in Pattaya.


Cook was convicted and handed a suspended sentence over his involvement in the Schneider murder after trying to help former Sydney gangster Antonio Bagnato flee the country and cross the border to Cambodia.


Bagnato was arrested, found guilty and sentenced to death over the murder but the sentence was later commuted to life in prison.


The Department of Foreign Affairs yesterday declined to comment on Cook’s sentencing citing privacy reasons.


A spokeswoman confirmed “the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is providing consular assistance to an Australian in Thailand”.


An Australian Federal Police spokesman said that it was not appropriate to comment as it was a matter for the Thai authorities.


“The AFP was briefed in relation to this matter following the arrest by Thai authorities,” he said yesterday. “The AFP had no involvement in the Thai investigation that resulted in this man’s arrest and subsequent conviction.”




Kanyarat Wechapitak and Luke Cook smuggled drugs.Picture: Facebook


The arrest of Cook and his 40-year-old wife in December was part of a series of raids by the Thai police in an operation dubbed Clipping The Wings Of Angels as it sought to smash Australian Outlaw Motorcycle Gang-led bikie chapters in Thailand.


Several Australians were arrested and deported and at least two remain on the run.


Thai police said the Australian men were involved in drugs, extortion, money laundering, weapons, human trafficking for the sex industry and posed a national threat to security.


An investigation last year found that in Thailand alone, 36 OMCG chapters had been established by Australian-led or affiliated gang members, particularly around tourist resort cities of Pattaya, Phuket and Chiang Mai and the capital Bangkok.


Chapters have also been established in Indonesia, Cambodia and Singapore.

https://thewest.com.au/news/court-ju...ng-b881020609z

Really dumb to compete with the Thai military.

Its just a money play, stump up, next

a thai court sentences aussie/thai couple the death sentence,for drug smugling.oh dear.
same day a thai court sentences a bus driver to 4yrs.jail for KILLING 18 people while high on drugs.
is there a connection.

Originally Posted by headhunter

a thai court sentences aussie/thai couple the death sentence,for drug smugling.oh dear.
same day a thai court sentences a bus driver to 4yrs.jail for KILLING 18 people while high on drugs.
is there a connection.

The connection is neither will do the full wedge.

Originally Posted by headhunter

a thai court sentences aussie/thai couple the death sentence,for drug smugling.oh dear.
same day a thai court sentences a bus driver to 4yrs.jail for KILLING 18 people while high on drugs.
is there a connection.

Grin and bear it, won't change; still 7 years for Thailand to shed it's 3rd World status, tick tock...

Originally Posted by Agent_Smith

Really dumb to compete with the Thai military.

Or (more appropriately) instead, it's really dumb to try competing against a Triad,...eh?...

Originally Posted by jabir

Grin and bear it, won't change; still 7 years for Thailand to shed it's 3rd World status, tick tock...

The 3rd. World status stigma, notwithstanding. Please, do ^ try to remember,...that Thai menfolk are really the Little Lord Fauntleroy (aristocrats) of the Kingdom...>therein<...is the difference. Capisce?...

Rayong Court of Appeals upholds death sentence for former Pattaya expat and Australian National Luke Cook, convicted in 2018 of methamphetamine smuggling

The following is sourced from Region 2 Thai Police:


On February 26th, 2020, the Region 2 Provincial Court of Appeals in Rayong Province in Thailand upheld the conviction and death sentence handed down in November 2018 from the lower court for Western Australian Mr. Luke Joshua Cook, his Thai partner Ms. Kanyarat Wediphitak and Californian Mr. Tyler Gerard.


All three were arrested during December 2017 for multiple criminal charges whereby the accusation was the failed importation of 500kg of methamphetamine by sea-going transport into the Thai Kingdom using the “JoMandy” yacht.


The yacht was acquired by Cook and his partner from Malaysia using the couples unlicensed Thai boat importation business named “Global Marine Solution”, which according to Region 2 Police was specifically for unlawful operations funded by now deceased senior Pattaya and Australian Hells Angels member Mr. Wayne Rodney Schneider.

According to the Court information, during May/June 2015, Mr. Cook and Mr. Gerard navigated the “Jomandy” from a marina nearby Pattaya City to rendezvous in international waters with a Chinese vessel whereby the narcotics were loaded onboard the yacht.


Enroute back to the marina Thai Navy vessels on routine night patrol approached the yacht and the shipment of narcotics was dumped overboard and washed ashore onto the Thai coastlines beaches where it was discovered by local Thai Residents.


If successful the plan was that the narcotics were to be stored temporarily in Thailand while a custom made keel was to be built to replace the existing yachts keel. The plan was then that the narcotics were to be concealed within and the yacht sailed to Australia from Thailand.


Six months later in December 2015 Mr. Cook and Mr. Gerard were arrested and plead guilty to charges related to the abduction, death and burial of Mr. Schneider which had dominated local Pattaya press at the time.

Mr. Antonio Bagnato was also arrested, whom denied the charges and ultimately was sentenced to three years for assault after a successful appeal application against the death sentence issued by the lower court.


Investigations uncovered that Mr. Sornchai Chamcharn aka “Mr Mo” of Pattaya’s Unity Law Group was initially assigned as the lawyer to represent the accused in the Schneider case however was contacted by Cook’s wife whom he claims viciously dismissed him and later appeared as a consultant and court translator with her handpicked legal team.


Earlier media coverage from ABC news Australia reported that the Schneider case suffered a “big communication barrier” and “degenerated into a farce” which was later confirmed to be caused by the impartial involvement and influence of Cook’s Thai partner during judicial proceedings.


The Court of Appeals handed down the decision on Wednesday based on evidence and witness testimonies such as that given by the man who purchased the JoMandy yacht from Mr. Cook for significantly less than what Mr. Cook had purchased the yacht for earlier.



This was suspicious as Mr. Cook operated a business importing used boats into Thailand for a profit, and not a loss. Additionally, Mr. Cook and the two accused point blank denied any wrongdoing with no credible evidence to support their defense and claimed they had been framed by two prosecution witnesses, one of whom they claimed had rented the JoMandy from Mr. Cook and undertaken the failed meth importation.


This claim was deemed impossible by the Court as this witness was verified by foreign and Thai authorities such as Immigration to be in another country during the timeframe the crime was committed and not in the Kingdom of Thailand. Court officials identified that this confirmed the accused knew of the committed crime and in actuality were attempting to frame and falsify someone else for the crime.


Antonio Bagnato, Luke Cook and his wife are currently remanded in a Thai prison awaiting a trial date in July 2020 for charges relating to illegal firearms, several military grade, discovered in police raids after Schneider’s body was discovered.

All three have denied the firearms charges, however, investigators have advised that Luke Cook and his wife will likely be convicted as the firearms were found in his hotel and a rental vehicle that he was found to possess the keys for when arrested in December 2015.


Senior Thai Officials have stated that Mr. Cook and his wife are con-artists and compulsive liars, such as the couples claim they never had any dealings or contact with the Hells Angels.


Mr. Cook’s seized smartphone from 2017 shows a Facebook conversation with his wife where they together reference Hells Angels members arrested by Pol Lt Gen Surachate “Big Joke” Hakparn, in particular senior ranking member Mr. Chace “Nicky” Fellon Langhans referenced by the couple as “the young one” who Luke confirmed on the social media platform he has met.

Region 2 Senior Officials also told The Pattaya News that additional charges of Trans-national crime will be processed against the couple during April 2020 which carries a maximum sentence of 15 years, which is the same sentence term for the military weapons charge.


A second application for appeal is available for the three through Thailand’s Supreme Court where a final decision will be given to uphold the death sentence or not for the narcotics charges.

Rayong Court of Appeals upholds death sentence for former Pattaya expat and Australian National Luke Cook, convicted in 2018 of methamphetamine smuggling - The Pattaya News

Jeepers, almost comical.

Originally Posted by Agent_Smith

Really dumb to compete with the Thai military.

This is the answer.

Originally Posted by Fondles

bwahahahahaha, sucks to be them.

Freed of all charges.

From the Death Sentence to the Dismissal of All Charges: Thai Supreme Court Rules on the Cook and Gerard Narcotics Case - The Pattaya News

Originally Posted by YourDaddy

Freed of all charges.

From the Death Sentence to the Dismissal of All Charges: Thai Supreme Court Rules on the Cook and Gerard Narcotics Case - The Pattaya News

Must have been a truck sized brown envelope.

So much murkiness.

Australian on Thai death row for smuggling half a tonne of crystal meth released

An Australian man and his Thai wife sentenced to death for trafficking half a tonne of crystal methylamphetamine for the Hells Angels have been acquitted after four years in a Bangkok jail.


Luke Cook, 37, from Duncraig in Western Australia, arrived in Sydney on a Thai Airways flight on Sunday after being cleared by the Supreme Court in Bangkok last week.

Pleading his innocence since being jailed in 2017, the father of two had been convicted on the evidence provided by an Australian now wanted on a warrant for sex trafficking.


Cook, who was an offshore worker as well as running a bar and guest house in the coastal Thai town Pattaya, was accompanied to the departure gate at Bangkok airport by Australian embassy officials and will be held in quarantine in Sydney for a fortnight before being re-united with his two sons.


His father Paul Cook, a New Zealander, has campaigned tirelessly for his son’s release, maintaining he had been set up.


Cook’s Thai wife Kanyarat Wechapitak and an American man Tyler Gerard, who had also been sentenced to death after being convicted of drug smuggling, have also been released. Gerard flew back to the United States last Friday while Kanyarat has remained in Thailand.

Their trial had centred around claims by Thai police that Luke Cook had been paid $US10 million ($A13.7 million) by the Hells Angel’s bike gang to smuggle 500kg of methylamphetamine, or ice, into Australia in 2015 aboard his yacht Jomandy, on which Gerard was a crew hand.


Police alleged Cook had panicked when a Thai navy vessel approached and dumped the cargo overboard. They said a package of 50.4kg of the drug was later found on a beach near the Thai navy base of Sattahip in Chonburi province.

However, defence lawyers supported by the Melbourne-based Capital Punishment Justice Project claimed in their appeal that Cook and his fellow defendants had been framed by another fly-in, fly-out Australian offshore worker named Douglas Shoebridge.

Shoebridge, 38, a compass adjuster also known as “Big Daddy”, testified that Cook had confessed his crime to him.


Shoebridge left Thailand in 2019 after a warrant of arrest was issued by Bangkok Criminal Court against him and Tanzanian woman Sara Musa Chitanda for trafficking in women from East Africa to the sex trade in south-east Asia.


Shoebridge testified that Cook had hired him as a diver to go on three trips to look for gold which had been dumped offshore. On the third unsuccessful trip Shoebridge said Cook confessed that he was really searching for the drugs he had dumped overboard.


However, Shoebridge’s reliability as a witness was brought under question after a NSW inquest into the death of high-ranking Hells Angels member Wayne Schneider near Pattaya in 2015 shone a spotlight on the foreign criminal underworld there.

Sydney kickboxer Antonio Bagnato was in 2017 sentenced to death for Schneider’s murder and the inquest was told that the two cars used in the kidnapping and killing of Schneider were rented for Bagnato by Shoebridge’s partner Siriphan Saimart.


The inquest also heard that Shoebridge gave 100,000 Thai baht ($A4130) to Siriphan to rent a house in Pattaya where Schneider was tortured and killed.

Bagnato was later acquitted of the murder and re-sentenced for assault, as well as being arrested on illegal firearms charges.


In 2015 Cook pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting the escape of Bagnato to the Cambodian border following Schneider’s death.


Cook told a Thai court at the time that Bagnato, who had rented a room at his bar and guesthouse Jolly’s Piss Stop Bar, had turned up on his doorstep with a gun demanding that he drive him to the border. But Cook said he knew nothing about the murder.


While Bagnato was extradited from Cambodia, Cook was given a three-month jail term, fully suspended for two years.

Australian on Thai death row for smuggling half a tonne of crystal meth released

Thai Court Sentences Aussie /Thai Couple to Death For Drug Smuggling.

Running already here

The half tonne of meth has also been released.