Worthy Winner, Or A Thief?

[george]

Worthy winner, or a thief?

KHON KAEN: -- When a lottery jackpot is won stories of chance events that border on the miraculous usually follow, but the case of a 66-year-old man who won Bt6.2 million has given rise to stories in which luck is replaced, at least in part, by theft or attempted theft.

In the first version, a female lottery vendor accuses the old man of stealing four pairs of lottery tickets from her shop.

The vendor is Rosarin Sakdaroj, 22, from Khon Kaen's Mancha Khiri district. She filed a complaint at the district police station accusing Sit Kijpruek, 66, of stealing the tickets for the May 16 lottery.

One pair, whose number is 589207, won the first prize while two others - numbers 589206 and 589208 - won the prizes for numbers adjacent to the first-prize number.

A pair of first-prize lottery tickets fetches Bt6 million and each pair of the adjacent numbers fetches Bt100,000. After paying the tax on his winnings, Sit had Bt6.1 million left.

He gave it to his daughter, Darunee Kijpruek, 42, to open a savings account at the district branch of the Government Savings Bank. Soon after, however, he was arrested and the account was frozen.

Three days after the lottery results were announced, Rosarin filed a complaint with the police, saying she had seen Sit stealing tickets from her glass-covered lottery display case.

When asked why she had not filed her complaint earlier, Rosarin said she knew Sit well and intended to ask him to pay for the tickets when he returned from visiting relatives in Kamphaeng Phet.

Rosarin, whose shop is near a bus terminal, said Sit and his daughter had been waiting for a bus on a seat in front of her shop when he snatched the tickets from her display case. Then he left on a bus, she said.

Mancha Khiri police commander Colonel Khatcha Thatsart said that he decided to arrest Sit after the old man told him that he had bought two pairs of tickets from Kamphaeng Phet and two others from Khon Kaen.

Sale records showed, however, that the four pairs had been sold in Khon Kaen, Khatcha said.

But Sit, who has been released on bail, insists he bought the four pairs from Rosarin.

"I put a Bt500 banknote in her hand and she gave me Bt13 in change so how could she accuse me of stealing the tickets," Sit said.

It is true that he was waiting for a bus in front of Rosarin's shop on May 5, but he did not steal the tickets, he said.

He told police that he had bought the tickets in Kamphaeng Phet because he had bought other tickets there.

"I could not remember which ones I bought from which province," Sit said.

"I'll go back to Kamphaeng Phet to bring a relative who witnessed me buying tickets to testify to police," he said.

Following Sit's arrest, several Thai-language newspapers were quick to label him a thief who was "lucky" enough to steal winning tickets.

The headlines prompted Sit's lawyer, Samrit Chuasawathee, to consider lawsuits against the newspapers and Khatcha for giving interviews in which he implied that Sit was guilty.

The lawyer said he would fight for the bank to unfreeze the account, saying police had no right to ask a bank to freeze someone's account.

But Khatcha said he was simply doing his job and investigators had the right to ask a bank to freeze a questionable account.

"From now on, it will be up to the court to decide who should get the money. Police will simply compile accounts of witnesses and evidence to forward the case to a public prosecutor," Khatcha said.

Another lottery vendor in Khon Kaen, Alan Somthong, said the case could severely reduce ticket sales.

"If it's true as she claimed, she should have filed a complaint with police before the results were announced," Alan said.

"If she wins the case, the lottery business will definitely see turmoil."

Car saleswoman Sukonthip Yimyong could not agree more with Alan.

"If Sit loses the case, from now on people will not want to buy tickets because if they win big prizes the vendors could ask police to arrest them," she said.

--The Nation 2004-05-26

[NedKelly]

What a bitch. They will probably settle this out of court so that she withdraws her complaint.........her bank account will be fatter thanky ou for coming !! But I guess the old fella has enough to buy himself what he wants now anyway.