Death By Dump Truck

[girlx]

"Better than getting beat to death by an angry crowd or the other driver," thinks the offender. It's not a totally unfounded fear in Thailand.

On another TV thread a surprising number of foreign posters agreed they would do the same here in LOS. So, now it's more than just an "irresponsible Thai" problem, isn't it?

no, it seems to be irresponsible on both sides... talk things out for f's sake!

[Dakhar]

Question:

The truck driver reversed over the guy to nmake sure he's dead. HOW do they know that?

Someone must have seen it, right?

Now where i come from, that person would already be sitting in jail now for not immediately calling the police and thereby assisting a criminal (as the "backing up" was not part of an accident but plain murder).

Also everyone and their kid has a camera phone. Can't be too difficult to snap a pic of the truck and have it posted to every newspaper? SOMEone must know that truck, license plates or not.

Following that truck in a save distance and informing the police about it's destination would also be a good idea (and sure using a cellphone to talk to the cops during that ride wouldn't be considered violating the law against cellphone use during driving).

But seems like Thais in general are cowards, never get involved in anything. Often i have seen scenes of accidents where 100 people stand and watch a poor guy lying in the middle of the road after being struck by a bus or a taxi, yet nobody dares to assist.

In my country, in order to be approved for a driving license (i.e. before you are even allowed to sign the contract with a driving school) you must provide proof of having passed a course in "life saving measures at an accident scene" and should you come across an accident scene you are OBLIGED to assist the hurt and immediately alert police and ambulance. A car without a first-aid kit and a warning triangle on board will not pass the road-worthiness inspection and is hence not permitted to use public roads.

As much as i hate many regulations of my country, SOME of them should be implemented the world over.

R.I.P. for the poor guy.

Regards

Thanh

In my country it is illegal to leave the scene of an accident.

In my country.... often times people would feel woried about being sued for "attempting to practice medicine" without a license, training etc.

No mater how you slice it... it is screwed up where ever you are.

In my younger days, I saw a woman cause an accident, and she drove off....

I followed her, she eventually pulled over, & I took her name, number, driver license, plate numbers etc. SHe was a scared house wife. I then called the folks in the accident and gave them the information. (I knew the people). It would have been better to follow her and just call the cops & tell them where you are, what road you are on, direction, & discribe the car.... but back then no one had a mobile phone, and back then few people shot each other.

[kmart]

If the Thai driver managed to willfully reverse over his victim, then surely there was another person directing him with a whistle?

[Richb2004v2]

Could this not be a case of exaggeration, which is of course another thing that Thai’s, and all people generally, are prone to? Just because folk say it is a regular occurrence does not mean any of them have actually seen it with their own eyes. The guy probably got knocked over and the truck sped away. Whether it reversed over him is less likely.

[DP25]

So there is a common inside joke is that if you get abucted in America & the guy is white, check him for a salt shaker.... "tastes like chicken"

This is a 'common' inside joke in America? Have you ever even been to America?

And I agree with Richb2004v2. This probably did not happen like the story is not being told. It is most likely a hit and run combined with an urban legend.

[DP25]

Interesting story. I see no mention of the truck driver stopping his truck, reversing, and driving over the corpses of his victims, before speeding off again, which is the crime claimed in the original post. No one is going to take the time, or have the presence of mind, to actually do that. They are simply going to put their foot on the pedal and get out of there as soon as they can.

Edited April 10, 2008 by DP25

[DP25]

You can be confident of whatever you want. I suppose it's possible that at some point in history it has happened. 99% of people are going to flee as quickly as they can and get away from the scene of the crime, not look in their rear view mirror, shift in to reverse, drive backwards, then shift in to forward and drive off, all while witnesses are watching all this. And there must be witnesses if they know that this actually 'happened.'

The original story makes no sense. Thais are notorious gossipers and urban legends spread like wildfire here. Hysteria over kidnappings and 'organ theft', or knockout gas on trains, or hookers with breast cream that lets them rob punters, or the NGO officials who thinks there are a pills that makes women uncontrollably horny, are all common and widespread. I've seen someone killed by a car in Thailand. They didn't slow at all, much less reverse and back over their victim. These accidents happen at high speed and the driver barely even knows what has happened by the time it is done.

Thai people make stories up all the time. Most likely one of the construction crew accidentally killed this guy and they made up a story to cover themselves, rather than some mystery dump truck with no plates or markings hit him and backed over him again to make sure he was dead, all while being watched by the rest of the crew.

[Tony Clifton]

Last week on bypass road in Chonburi, about 8pm, in our pick-up truck and I had a double decker bus following me so close that I couldn't see his headlights, when I looked again in the mirror, I could barely see the glow and that he was flashing his headlights like a madman. He was pissed off that he couldn't go any faster, not my fault as there were about 50 more cars scattered in front, nowhere to go even though we're all doing 90-100. That section is 4 lanes wide, so I moved one lane to the right which means I was now in the outer right lane where buses and trucks are not allowed. This F%$# idiot stays just as close and changes lane with me but I still can't go anywhere because of the cars in front, so I moved back one lane to the left. The bus moved forward a bit and just as he's almost done overtaking us on the right, he violently steers to the left to try and crash into us which made him lose control for a while afterwards, there's another bus on my left... I don't know ho I did it but I managed to avoid him and the other bus. I was raving mad and wanted to kill the f^%$er because I had my wife and 3 month old baby in a car seat. I followed him for a few hundred meters and he cut off every one by crossing 4 lanes to take an exit, my wife was screaming and begging for me not to take the exit with him saying they mostly all carry handguns, I didn't care about the gun but the thought of leaving my wife and baby behind made me continue straight ahead. I took the overpass ahead and then pulled over and waited for the f&^er to get back onto Bypass and I had picked up two big rocks. He never came. My wife took the wheel and we left. I had once given my license to my wife saying I'd never drive again, afraid I'd get killed on the road or kill some motorcyclist myself, she refuses to let me drive now until we leave the country.

I still wish I had smashed his nose in , left a baby picture on his dashboard next to the Buddha, then broken both his legs and ten fingers so he couldn't drive for a long time.

F*&^ road viruses!

Edited April 10, 2008 by Tony Clifton

[Richb2004v2]

^ Far from just an "urban legend" or exaggeration in Thailand I'm afraid, which is why I made the ivory tower comment earlier.

Remember this one?

DRIVER'S DEATH SENTENCE

A drunk driver has been sentenced to death in Thailand.

The 23-year-old was behind the wheel of a six-wheel truck when he killed four people last year.

Another four people were injured and five vehicles damaged in the northeastern province of Mahasarakham.

Nattapong Raksapong first struck a motorcycle, sped away and then crashed into two other motorbikes.

He tried to flee but crashed into a truck.

He denied charges of intentionally trying to kill someone, saying he was just involved in an accident.

The sentence has been hailed as a landmark ruling.

"This is a historic verdict and should set a precedent in cases of drunken drivers who kill innocent people on the roads," said Surasit Silapangam, of the Don't Drink and Drive Foundation.

He said drunken driving was involved in some 80% of the more than 14,500 deaths and one million injuries on Thailand's roads last year.

Thailand has one of the world's highest mortality rates from road accidents.

Source: Sky News

I don't see the connection with him intentionally trying to kill someone. It reads like he was drunk, hit a bike, and then hit two more in a drunken attempt to escape. I can easily believe this. Reversing over someone I find much harder to believe.

The bus incident I can also believe.

If we all believed every childish story we hear from Thais things would be pretty bad. I prefer to trust my own judgment.

[Tony Clifton]

I told the story about the dump truck to my wife and she wasn't surprised at all and said it's been done countless times.