Anti-Corruption police arrested a top public prosecutor at his office in Nakhon Si Thammarat province on Wednesday for reportedly asking for and accepting money to drop a case.
Anti-Corruption Division (ACD) police arrested 53-year-old Chartnarin Ketkamphon at the Office of the Attorney-General (OAG) Nakhon Si Thammarat branch office around 11 a.m, according to Thai Media.
They also took the claimed bribe money, 150,000 baht, as proof. He was the head lawyer at the provincial office of prosecution.
The Central Criminal Court for Corruption and Misconduct Cases issued an arrest warrant for Mr. Chartnarin on charges of taking a bribe as a government worker, failing to do his job, and abusing his power to get money or other benefits.
A police source said that the accused provincial judge had asked a person who was suspected of stealing a land title for 200,000 baht as a bribe. According to reports, he said he could get the case dropped.
At the time, officials were looking into the case, so the person he talked to was afraid that he would be punished if he didn’t pay the money. He made up his mind to give Mr. Chartnarin 50,000 baht as an advance payment.
He later talked to someone at the National Anti-Corruption Commission about the claimed demand for a bribe. A probe into this led to the creation of an arrest warrant for top prosecutor Chartnarin.
Wednesday was the due date for the accuser to pay Mr. Chartnarin the last 150,000 baht, so the police planned a sting operation. After the money was given to the lawyer, he was arrested. When questioned, Mr. Chartnarin rejected all the charges.
On Wednesday, an OAG spokesman named Prayut Phetcharakhun said that the attorney-general had ordered Mr. Chartnarin’s quick move and told the head of OAG Region 8, Chatchai Jaidee, to quickly file a report on the case.
A spokeswoman for the agency said that the bribery claim would affect the whole body. The accused lawyer would face harsh punishments from the OAG, including criminal charges and fines. It had to wait for the report from the regional office for now.
Fake Public Prosecutor Illegally Appointed
While this was going on, Mr. Mongkol Preesukkasem was caught pretending to be a prosecutor. It turned out that the Thanyaburi Provincial Office of the Attorney General had illegally made him a level-five prosecutor last year, the Bangkok Post reports.
On Wednesday, news came out on Thai social Media that a picture of a certificate signed by the office on March 26 of last year was shared in a Line chat group for attorneys.
The letter confirmed that Mr. Mongkol, who was working as an advisor to Pol Lt Uthai Artiwet, who was the director-general of the Office of the Attorney General’s investigative office at the time, had the same rank as a level-five investigator. Pol Lt Uthai is the presently the acting deputy attorney general of OAG Region 8.
The letter also said that Mr. Mongkol was a responsible, decent, and honest person who had been helping the Office of the Attorney General.
Somebody said that the Thanyaburi office didn’t have the power to give him the license because his role as an advisor wasn’t official and wasn’t the same as a prosecutor at any level.
If you are a level-five lawyer, you are just as important as a provincial chief public prosecutor or an expert public prosecutor.
The Taling Chan police station in Bangkok arrested Mr. Mongkol last Thursday while he was making a speech about law enforcement at a high school in Nonthaburi. He was wearing a prosecutor’s outfit during the talk.
For impersonation, wearing a prosecutor’s uniform, fraud, and putting fake information into a computer system, the Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for him on June 20.
Press reports also said that Mr. Mongkol cannot wear the uniform or say that he is an adviser because Pol Lt Uthai, who named him as an adviser, is no longer the director-general.
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