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Embattled Brit Lee Chestnutt Forced To Stay In Thailand


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Seems to me this is a great way of extending your stay without having to worry about visa runs. Have someone take you to cort on a petty charge; have him keep appealing the not guilty verdict and voila you are entitled to stay without worrying about visas.

Yerh great thinking only one small problem. How is he supposed to support himself?

The post was meant to be only half serious. The plan would only work of course if you had funds to support yourself.

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Supposedly this has gone on for three years ... right or wrong sometimes it is better to just suck it up and pay then worrying about being right. How much can the furniture have cost compared to lawyer fees and what has been reported he has had to deal with including appeals to the Supreme Court.

And why would somebody need an exit visa if the case had been cleared? If he thought the matter was cleared up. I'd think he would just head to the airport. I am not experienced in such matters but thought you only need an exit visa if you were a citizen of a nation that has travel restrictions or there were legal issues such as an ongoing case which seems to be the circumstances here.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...hester-20589033

So you are saying he should just suck it up and take what the THAI is throwing at him regardless, bow down and kiss the feet of this Thai landlord who apparently is trying to extort money out of him. Let me guess Nisa, you are a Thai woman right?

If he is right, and that seems to be the case, as it was dropped, then this guy has some ticker. Probably to his own detriment he is doing it, but it seems he is a man of principle, so takes them on. Good on him. Give him 11 out of 10. Hope he sticks it right up them.

Lets flip your coin and instead say more power to the landlord for standing up to "them" by holding a bad renter to take responsibility for damages even if it means costing him a lot more to do so than just accepting the damages.

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Supposedly this has gone on for three years ... right or wrong sometimes it is better to just suck it up and pay then worrying about being right. How much can the furniture have cost compared to lawyer fees and what has been reported he has had to deal with including appeals to the Supreme Court.

And why would somebody need an exit visa if the case had been cleared? If he thought the matter was cleared up. I'd think he would just head to the airport. I am not experienced in such matters but thought you only need an exit visa if you were a citizen of a nation that has travel restrictions or there were legal issues such as an ongoing case which seems to be the circumstances here.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...hester-20589033

So you are saying he should just suck it up and take what the THAI is throwing at him regardless, bow down and kiss the feet of this Thai landlord who apparently is trying to extort money out of him. Let me guess Nisa, you are a Thai woman right?

I think what several comments suggest is that the Brit needs to be "pragmatic","realistic". Its possible to wear a morally superior tone whilst compromising legally. It happens in the business world all the time and is part of the price of doing business in emerging-Asia; as Dad reminds us regularly. After all, it hardly pays to win the battle and lose the war (something which seems to have happened in this case) or as some may say what good is cutting my nose to spite my face. Its takes both bxlls and brains to be pragmatic, to be realistic.

It is the part of life and doing business all over the world. This isn't an Asian or Thai thing. This is a matter of cutting loses or deciding to take the least painful way out of a bad situation ... this is just life 101. He is not fighting for honor or justice or standing up to anybody but an ex-landlord and he hasn't even filed charges against the landlord to hold him accountable for anything ... in other words he loses no matter what in this case but it is up to him how much he loses in terms of freedom. pain and suffering, his money, his families money, his career ....

And on top of all of this, we don't even know if the guy is completely innocent. That is still be decided but I think a fair analysis would be both the landlord and tenant have issues that go well beyond the furniture and I would guess there was some damaged furniture but not to the extent the landlord is claiming .. regardless of where you are in the world there are always two sides and the truth often is found in the middle in cases like this.

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Supposedly this has gone on for three years ... right or wrong sometimes it is better to just suck it up and pay then worrying about being right. How much can the furniture have cost compared to lawyer fees and what has been reported he has had to deal with including appeals to the Supreme Court.

And why would somebody need an exit visa if the case had been cleared? If he thought the matter was cleared up. I'd think he would just head to the airport. I am not experienced in such matters but thought you only need an exit visa if you were a citizen of a nation that has travel restrictions or there were legal issues such as an ongoing case which seems to be the circumstances here.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...hester-20589033

So you are saying he should just suck it up and take what the THAI is throwing at him regardless, bow down and kiss the feet of this Thai landlord who apparently is trying to extort money out of him. Let me guess Nisa, you are a Thai woman right?

I think what several comments suggest is that the Brit needs to be "pragmatic","realistic". Its possible to wear a morally superior tone whilst compromising legally. It happens in the business world all the time and is part of the price of doing business in emerging-Asia; as Dad reminds us regularly. After all, it hardly pays to win the battle and lose the war (something which seems to have happened in this case) or as some may say what good is cutting my nose to spite my face. Its takes both bxlls and brains to be pragmatic, to be realistic.

It is the part of life and doing business all over the world. This isn't an Asian or Thai thing. This is a matter of cutting loses or deciding to take the least painful way out of a bad situation ... this is just life 101. He is not fighting for honor or justice or standing up to anybody but an ex-landlord and he hasn't even filed charges against the landlord to hold him accountable for anything ... in other words he loses no matter what in this case but it is up to him how much he loses in terms of freedom. pain and suffering, his money, his families money, his career ....

And on top of all of this, we don't even know if the guy is completely innocent. That is still be decided but I think a fair analysis would be both the landlord and tenant have issues that go well beyond the furniture and I would guess there was some damaged furniture but not to the extent the landlord is claiming .. regardless of where you are in the world there are always two sides and the truth often is found in the middle in cases like this.

Admitting a criminal charge would lead to some pretty serious consequences wouldn't it? Immediate deportation being one of them.

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Nisa

Not sure I follow and why the coin needs to be flipped. It says the charges were initially dropped. Surely that sort of means there wasn't a case?

By virtue of the fact he has been fighting it all this time would indicate a guy with principles, thinking he is in the right, rather than just roll over.

Like someone posted, if there was some damage would not that have been subtracted from the bond?

Edited by Fozfromoz
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If he is right, and that seems to be the case, as it was dropped, then this guy has some ticker. Probably to his own detriment he is doing it, but it seems he is a man of principle, so takes them on. Good on him. Give him 11 out of 10. Hope he sticks it right up them.

Lets flip your coin and instead say more power to the landlord for standing up to "them" by holding a bad renter to take responsibility for damages even if it means costing him a lot more to do so than just accepting the damages.

Nisa

Not sure I follow and why the coin needs to be flipped. It says the charges were initially dropped. Surely that sort of means there wasn't a case?

So, you think courts always get it right every time or that the current appeal could never result in the guy being held accountable? Even in your post you prefaced it by saying, "If he was right" and I was simply saying there is a flip side to this thought of the tenant being a principled man if the landlord is actually in the right and wondering if it then should be the landlord given 11 out 10 for fighting so hard and continuing to appeal until he gets justice or exhausts all appeals even if it likely costs him significantly more than the furniture in question.

Edit: In my mind it would make the landlord an idiot regardless if principled even though there are no reports of his family suffering or needing to support him for years or his not being able to leave the country because of his long and costly fight to defend his principles over who should pay for missing and damaged furniture in a rental unit.

Edited by Nisa
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If he is right, and that seems to be the case, as it was dropped, then this guy has some ticker. Probably to his own detriment he is doing it, but it seems he is a man of principle, so takes them on. Good on him. Give him 11 out of 10. Hope he sticks it right up them.

Lets flip your coin and instead say more power to the landlord for standing up to "them" by holding a bad renter to take responsibility for damages even if it means costing him a lot more to do so than just accepting the damages.

Nisa

Not sure I follow and why the coin needs to be flipped. It says the charges were initially dropped. Surely that sort of means there wasn't a case?

So, you think courts always gets it right every time or that the current appeal could never result in the guy be held accountable? Even in your post you prefaced it by saying, "If he was right" and I was simply saying there is a flip side to this thought of the tenant being a principled man if the landlord is actually in the right and wondering if it then should be him given 11 out 10 for fighting so hard and continuing to appeal until he gets justice or exhausts all appeals .despite it likely costing him significantly more than the furniture in question.

I tell you what, how about you quote all of my post and not an excerpt, I will reply. Firstly I said " if he is right and that seems to be the case"

The second part why did you only include the first paragraph?

Why would someone fight for this long, to his own financial and emotional detriment, if he didn't think he was right, or more bluntly, being shafted? I mean he could have just paid some money for the "alleged" damage and walked away.

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If he is right, and that seems to be the case, as it was dropped, then this guy has some ticker. Probably to his own detriment he is doing it, but it seems he is a man of principle, so takes them on. Good on him. Give him 11 out of 10. Hope he sticks it right up them.

Lets flip your coin and instead say more power to the landlord for standing up to "them" by holding a bad renter to take responsibility for damages even if it means costing him a lot more to do so than just accepting the damages.

And how many times would you like it flipped Nisa until it falls in favour of the Thai.

Sorry, I thought it was pretty easy concept to grasp the meaning that both the Thai and farang are and would be idiots and making excuses such as giving the farang props for standing up for his beliefs (at his family expenses and his own freedom) over rental furniture makes no sense. To show just how idiotic it is, I provided another scenario that I know is hard to swallow because it means seeing a Thai and Westerner in the same light but still thought it would not be so hard to grasp the point.

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tell you what, how about you quote all of my post and not an excerpt, I will reply. Firstly I said " if he is right and that seems to be the case"

The second part why did you only include the first paragraph?

Why would someone fight for this long, to his own financial and emotional detriment, if he didn't think he was right, or more bluntly, being shafted? I mean he could have just paid some money for the "alleged" damage and walked away.

re: http://www.thaivisa....25#entry6024661

I pasted in your entire quote and my response (which you deleted in of your response to me) that you were replying about and I simply pointed out how you prefaced your words, which added but didn't take away from my point. If you choose not to see the point I was making then so be it but please don;t allude to me taking your words out of context or misquoting you, especially when I pasted in your entire words which you previously removed.

Edit: Again flip the coin and ask yourself the same question about the landlord and why he is fighting and wasting resources for so long. Bottom line, given the information we have, they both are stubborn fools ... and that was pretty much my point.

Edited by Nisa
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If he was found guilty by the criminal court the other side can appeal the decision the the appeal courts. They have 30 days to lodge the appeal BUT they can ask the courts for an additional 30 days up to 3 times so they have 120 days from criminal court judgement to lodge the appeal.

It generally takes 1 year for a case to go to the criminal courts but an appeal will take at least 1 year and up to 3 years to be heard.

If the appeal court overturns the initial criminal courts findings either party can take it to the supreme court.

So it seems found not guilty initially but appeal lodged. They can not bypass the appeal court and go straight to the supreme court.

And what a complete screw up of a system that is.

It's a lot faster than the UK, where there are some unresolved cases from 10-20 years ago.

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kill someone with gun or car and you got free on bail for few thousand baht and disappear...... brake a chair and scratch a table and you are stuck here and they refuse to let you go ..... what kind of justice is that ? it seems there are 2 justices here one for thais and one for farang . how nice is that ?

It is the same justice system, and applies to both Thais and foreigners. He is as free to disappear as the other people you mention, so not sure what you're trying to say there. This seems to be a civil dispute, not a criminal case.

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If he was found guilty by the criminal court the other side can appeal the decision the the appeal courts. They have 30 days to lodge the appeal BUT they can ask the courts for an additional 30 days up to 3 times so they have 120 days from criminal court judgement to lodge the appeal.

It generally takes 1 year for a case to go to the criminal courts but an appeal will take at least 1 year and up to 3 years to be heard.

If the appeal court overturns the initial criminal courts findings either party can take it to the supreme court.

So it seems found not guilty initially but appeal lodged. They can not bypass the appeal court and go straight to the supreme court.

And what a complete screw up of a system that is.

It's a lot faster than the UK, where there are some unresolved cases from 10-20 years ago.

I just don't understand the meaning of what they write. Charges dismissed, but still able to appeal? This type of thing just doesn't compute. Dismissed by whom? Who brought the case, the landlord or the coppers? On what grounds is an appeal accepted? After many years here, it still mysitfies me.

It just seems to me that the system can get held up forever with appeal after appeal, when there appears to have been a conclusion, only for the system to restart. But at who's request?

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If he was found guilty by the criminal court the other side can appeal the decision the the appeal courts. They have 30 days to lodge the appeal BUT they can ask the courts for an additional 30 days up to 3 times so they have 120 days from criminal court judgement to lodge the appeal.

It generally takes 1 year for a case to go to the criminal courts but an appeal will take at least 1 year and up to 3 years to be heard.

If the appeal court overturns the initial criminal courts findings either party can take it to the supreme court.

So it seems found not guilty initially but appeal lodged. They can not bypass the appeal court and go straight to the supreme court.

And what a complete screw up of a system that is.

It's a lot faster than the UK, where there are some unresolved cases from 10-20 years ago.

I have a case at the moment (In Aust) that has been going since 2004. Insurance company keeps stalling hoping I will go away.
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tell you what, how about you quote all of my post and not an excerpt, I will reply. Firstly I said " if he is right and that seems to be the case"

The second part why did you only include the first paragraph?

Why would someone fight for this long, to his own financial and emotional detriment, if he didn't think he was right, or more bluntly, being shafted? I mean he could have just paid some money for the "alleged" damage and walked away.

re: http://www.thaivisa....25#entry6024661

I pasted in your entire quote and my response (which you deleted in of your response to me) that you were replying about and I simply pointed out how you prefaced your words, which added but didn't take away from my point. If you choose not to see the point I was making then so be it but please don;t allude to me taking your words out of context or misquoting you, especially when I pasted in your entire words which you previously removed.

Edit: Again flip the coin and ask yourself the same question about the landlord and why he is fighting and wasting resources for so long. Bottom line, given the information we have, they both are stubborn fools ... and that was pretty much my point.

Not quite. Just to dot the I and cross the T. I did not delete any of your post. It appears that you edited your post 42 around the same time I responded to it in my post 44. The edited para seems to be missing. You didn't post all of mine in your 42 which I raised in 44. No matter.

Cheers

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I just don't understand the meaning of what they write. Charges dismissed, but still able to appeal? This type of thing just doesn't compute. Dismissed by whom? Who brought the case, the landlord or the coppers? On what grounds is an appeal accepted? After many years here, it still mysitfies me.

It just seems to me that the system can get held up forever with appeal after appeal, when there appears to have been a conclusion, only for the system to restart. But at who's request?

I agree.

If the charge/case was dismissed there is no grounds for appeal. The guy must of been found not guilty and thats what's being appealed. TiT they don't need solid grounds for appeal unfortunately.

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I didn't read that he was found "not guilty" by any court, only that charges had been dropped.

Charges can be dropped by Thai authorities, for any number of reason, the most common is lack of confession on the part of the accused.

The accuser can then take prosecution on themselves. That may be what is happening here.

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I think this case highlights one of the down sides of living abroad. It can be great- until it isn't...

Looks like the landlord is in the position of power here and clearly does not want to let the issue go. For Mr. Chestnutt, sometimes even when you are right, you're wrong. Better to reach an agreement before a dispute finds its way to the legal system.

It would be interesting to know the amount of damages and the compensation the landlord is seeking :)

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So, what will happen? Not guilty at the court first time around, and then appeal after appeal after appeal from the other side?

If he was not guilty at the criminal courts and the police appeal to the appeal court where he is again found not guilty he is free there can be no more appeals from the police. If the appeal court finds him guilty he can then appeal to the supreme court. If he is found guilty a second time at the supreme court he can ask the King to assist.

Problem is it takes YEARS to happen.....

So do the police have to decide to take the accusation forward? Or can the plaintive insist?

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One would assume that either his passport is being held or there is a stamp in it not allowing him to leave the country. Either way, his details will be on the computer not allowing him to leave the country iegally.

Therefore he is waiting for a decision from a court, presumably, as opposed to the police, that allows him to leave.

If the landlord has some status, has good contacts and is minded to pursue this, who knows when that will be.

It could be worse, the landlord could have tried to have him held in custody pending a decision or a trial. Some trials stretch out for years.

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Not sure why so many think the landlord is at fault. None of you know the evidence. It could be the case that the tenant caused damage and stole stuff and the landlord wants to be compensated. Maybe the police dropped the case because they didn't think there was enough evidence to charge the tenant. But maybe the landlord doesn't agree. Imagine that you were a landlord and a tenant caused damage and stole stuff, would you let the tenant get away with it. Of course, I have no idea who's in the right or wrong here. But too many of you seem to think you know, when you have no idea.

If the tenant really did steal stuff, he's hardly likely to admit it, otherwise he might end up in jail, so he'd have to stick to his story. Same with the landlord. If he's in the right, he's going to keep pursuing this.

But we don't know, so it's a bit pointless speculating.

This doesn't seem like a Thai vs Farang battle, like many on here would like it to be. It's just landlord vs tenant. If you decide to live in a foreign country, then you have to accept that you are subject to the laws of that country. If you can't take that, then you shouldn't be here. It works the same the other way. In the UK there have been some foreigners locked up for years without even being charged with anything. At least this guy knows what he's fighting against. I'd rather be in Thailand fighting a case, than locked up in the UK without charges.

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OK ... the ACTUAL facts (from someone who knows):

1. 3.5 years ago plaintiff attempted to extort 500,000 THB and threatened with copies of passports and an arrest warrant. 2 plaintiffs - a) retired high ranking police officer & b ) employee of Thai embassy in London

2. Defendants refused to pay and were arrested walking out of the meeting in Starbucks. Spent one night in jail - released on bail following day.

3. 2 charges - a) theft of 5 pieces of furniture (from an UNFURNISHED house) 200,000 THB & cool.png criminal damage of 192,000 THB (which they did not commit)

4. Court verdict NOT GUILTY 18th Jan 2010

5. Plaintiffs appealed ONLY ONE charge (criminal damage). First court refused to back the appeal and said that the charges cannot be split. Prosecutor backed the appeal and was therefore accepted by 1st appeal court.

6. Appeal court verdict 4th Dec 2012 - NOT GUILTY

7. Waited 30 days for documents to clear in order to handle immigration and be able to leave. Court confirmed documents cleared 10th Jan 2013

8. 14th Jan 2013 - Documents revoked and immigration block not removed due to request by Plaintiffs to have a 60 day extension to allow appeal to be submitted to Supreme Court (still only the criminal damage charge).

Hope that helps!

So one would expect to have an inventory of furnitures present at the property - if that is missing then techncially the property was empty - in this case could youy counter sue for costs (living costs incurred during the 3 year process, legal costs of defending the case and possible damages for mental trauma etc)

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