Itthipol's timeline
from a ThaiPBS article on September 06, 2023
Former Culture Minister Itthiphol Kunplome wanted on corruption charges has left Thailand for Cambodia before an arrest warrant was issued against him, said an immigration police source on Wednesday.
Ittiphol boarded Cambodia Airways flight KR0702 from Bangkok to Phnom Penh on August 30, the source said.
tthiphol was supposed to report to the provincial public prosecutor to acknowledge the charges filed against him by the Region 2 NACC, but he did not do so, prompting the prosecutor to issue a summons. Again, he failed to show up and is believed to have fled from Thailand on August 30, so the prosecutor sought at an arrest warrant.
from The Nation article on October 09, 2023
Itthipol disembarked his flight from Phnom Penh at Suvarnabhumi Airport at 10am and was immediately taken into custody by immigration police.
The arrest warrant was issued last month after Itthipol fled Thailand on August 30, one day after the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) ordered him to be prosecuted.
At 12.35pm on Monday, Itthipol was taken to the OAG’s Area 2 Office for corruption cases in Rayong’s Muang district to hear the charges. He was accompanied by his lawyer.
He smiled at waiting reporters as he entered the building, but made no comment.
I read this as follows:
The prosecutors waited 15 years and charged him one month before the statute expired. He subsequently fled to Cambodia for a month and came back beginning of October, about 20 days after his case's statute had expired. And now these charges were dismissed by the court on the grounds that the statute had expired.
A finely choreographed charade, paid for by the Thai taxpayer. He did not "take advantage of" or "play" the system, he followed every step in the way the system was designed for, from the way the prosecutors "prosecuted", to the limit of the "limited" statutes, to the court's "courted" verdict. Beautiful.