Snatch-and-run Bandits Nabbed In Phuket

[brahmburgers]

7.5yrs for stealing a bag is a lot of time for such a crime!

Unlikely they'll do more than 6 months. I finally caught a thief who had been stealing things from me for months (long story). Police said he'd get 1.5 years. He was out in half that time.

Q; did the thieves have any weapons? If a guy is with his gal and a thief does a grab, then it's impulsive for the guy to to chase after or otherwise try to apprehend the thief. However, by doing so, the guy could be sliced open or shot. Am curious whether these sorts of criminals normally use weapons. Also, if they're found to have any weapons, even a small knife, their sentence should be much longer.

[denishuahin]

I feel really sorry for these people not only robbed of their camera but robbed their memories as well these can never be replaced.

I was married in St Lucia 18 years ago and had my video camera stolen at Heathrow on my return. The camera was worth £500 sold maybe in a local pub for £50, the film was irreplaceable you can’t cannot put a price memories, showing you kids etc . Tell them Hua Hin next time it’s safer.

Maybe the robbers will remember the day they took the bag, let’s wait and see how they get away with it as you never seem to find out if they go to jail or pay off the police.

[Jirapa]

7.5yrs for stealing a bag is a lot of time for such a crime!

And a lifetime is a long time to have memories of a violent robbery.

These type of lowlifes should be taught consequences for their thoughtless, greedy, impulsive actions.

Tourism, community image, victim self esteem, development of prejudice, criminal confidence, thousands of people in fear of where they live - these are all affected or developed if petty crime reigns unchecked.

Don't be silly, having your bag snatched isn't going to haunt anyone who isn't rediculously hypersensitive. No violence as no one was hurt. What next? 6 months for spitting on the pavement.

[ovaltina]

We stayed in Kamala Beach last year and kept away from the beach road (where the photo is taken), exactly because of the many poor looking guys on motorbikes hanging out there.

Hmm besides the fact that this kind of journalism is very uninteresting and can be called scoreboard journalism, these crimes are very uncommon in Thailand. If I had to stay away from any place in the USA, Australia or Europe where there were poor looking guys outside, I could lock myself up in my house.

Thailand is absurd safe. The given fact that this is a breaking news story says either a lot about the editors here or about the criminality in Thailand. Visit any given police station in London. Amsterdam, New York, Miami or Sydney and you will notice that they book and let go small time criminals like that 20 times an hour......

So true.In England the BBC reported the figures for 2008/9 : "Freedom of Information requests were sent to all police forces in England and Wales, asking how often cases of serious violence are punished by caution. The results from 39 of the 41 forces revealed that almost 39,000 cases of actual bodily harm (ABH) resulted in a caution last year. A further 739 cases of the more serious offence of grievous bodily harm also resulted in cautions."

Many of these 40,000 violent assaults were with weapons, and the offender just gets a "don't do it again, now off you go home" Caution. That's in 'civilised' England, where I've been burgled 4 times,mugged 8 times (hospitalised twice) just going to work or shops etc. in my 40ish years.

I've been in Thailand a total of 3 years only, practiced the same common sense approach to safety as I always did, & have never been robbed or injured in Thailand.

[flyfrog]

I live in KL most of the time where we have a lot of this.

I absolutely detest these brave warriors who earn living by taking handbags from women.

If the victims read this – do not despair! Most of your photos are almost certainly recoverable using an un-delete program like ‘Easy Recovery’

Just remember – do not switch on the camera any more and DO NOT take any new pictures on the same memory card.

If you are still in Phuket tonight (Wed) and can get the camera to Surin Beach I’d be delighted to recover them for you. I have the program.

Good luck and sorry your visit turned out so badly.

Mark (089 919 1596)

Same here in Pattaya, but the police catches 80% of the culprits, how they do is for me guess, so fast, you never see the police but when something happen they're there in 10 minutes.

[newtronbom]

The pictures may be recoverable

I'll second that. The pictures are most likely recoverable, even using a free program. I recovered over 80% from an SD memory card that had been formatted.

[arthurwait]

We stayed in Kamala Beach last year and kept away from the beach road (where the photo is taken), exactly because of the many poor looking guys on motorbikes hanging out there.

Poor looking people on motorbikes in Thailand. Whatever next.

[Gats]

"One thing we don't understand is why they had to view and delete all the photos in our camera. Those photos really meant a lot to us," she said.

--

Umm...because they stole your stuff, and weren't planning on returning it...that coupled with the fact that there weren't, likely, any interesting shots in there.

Haha yeah it's a bit of a silly comment. Totally empathise with the victims, but geez what did you think he was going to do... "Hey you want to buy a camera? Just in case you question where I got it from, I left all the photos of the previous owners on there. You want their phone number and my id too?"

If victims read this, PM me for info about how to recover the files. Deletion doesn't usually remove the data, just sort of "marks it" as empty.