My neighbour was shot and killed a few weeks ago by her estranged husband. He also killed a mechanic who worked for her family's petrol station (North of Ban Chang palace). Anyone hear about this / witness this shooting? Her name was Noi Na.

My neighbour enjoyed getting drunk and firing his pistol into the air at 2pm outside my bedroom window, not very neighbourly so as a consequence I rarely talked to him. His wife was pleasant enough though. The police failed to take his gun away, even after he had kidnapped his wife and had held her hostage on several occasions. It was an accident (or murder) waiting to happen. I think the police could of avoided the murder by taking his gun away, however they did catch the guy (after he conveniently crashed his car after a car chase).

Last year one of the private ambulance drivers was a victim of a drive by shooting outside Kitchen Friend whilost my wife was doing her shopping (mafia?). Just how common are these events (which never seem to receive cover from the farang newspapers)? I think Ban Chang is no more dangerous than any other small provincial town in Thailand and Pattaya seems to be a far more dangerous place to live, however it's worrying that these incidents just don't seem to receive any attention from the media (or forums).

If you have any more details on these two events (or others) please post.

My 2 cents worth here is these things happen as a matter of life with a world full of alcohol and guns.

The lack of coverage? You begin to realize that Banchang as you say is a small, provincial town among many and no more special than any other. I think it would take a lot more than a drunk neighbor shooting his wife to capture the attention of the big papers in BKK or in Pattaya for that matter. If it involved a farang maybe.

Why would some farang paper cover, a sorry to say, an every day type of thing like this in a small place like Banchang?

It is a sad thing that people act this way in any country but as we say, "sh#$ happens".

Is Banchang any more or less dangerous than any other small town in LOS? I don't think so.

We just have to be careful and watch our own butts and never, never get personally involved in a domestic dispute of someone else.

The ambulance drivers or body recovery companies compete with each other violently in Bangkok, and are often shooting at each other for invading each others' turf.

See here for a video of a drunk driver hitting and killing, I believe, a member of an ambulance or similar kind of team loading a bike onto a pickup truck, probably after a previous accident or something. The video is on youtube and it's not for the faint of heart. Notice their violent reaction to the drunk driver. It may not be an ambulance team, but this is the kind of violent behavior you see from those private companies. In this case it's understandable though, as the drive had just killed or seriously injured their friend.