Receptionist drugged, hotel robbed in Phuket

Tanyaluk Sakoot

PHUKET: -- Police are looking for a foreigner who drugged the receptionist at the Karon Place Hotel, Phuket, on Monday (January 14) and then robbed the safety deposit boxes behind the counter.

The belongings of 21 hotel guests, believed to worth as much as B3 million, were stolen. The thief also took away the recording from the hotel’s CCTV camera.

Superintendent of Investigations, Pol Col Wanchai Palawan told The Phuket News, “The robber gave coffee to the receptionist who felt drowsy and then fell asleep.”

When he woke up he found all the safety boxes had been opened and their contents stolen.

The Deputy Commander of Phuket Town Police, Col Arun Keawwati said, “Hotel guests who left their belongings in the safety boxes have lost passports, cash in a variety of currencies, cameras and mobile phones.”

Col Arun said the robber was “Middle East looking” with fair skin. He added that police believe the robbery may be the work of a gang. “There was a similar robbery in Samui,” he explained.

Source: http://www.thephuket...huket-36367.php

-- The Phuket News 2013-01-17

Farangs drugging Thais? That's a twist.

Who puts there Mobile/Cell phone in the hotels safety deposit boxes ??? would they not be using them

Where else but the sow's nest of Phuket? The entire city should be closed by the Consumer Protection Office.

The logical explanation is that they were purchasing cheap pre-pay cell phones here and keeping their expensive phones from their perspective countries in the hotel safe deposit boxes.

I was thinking the same thing. After I was thinking it was an inside job and a fabricated story of a foreigner.

Sounds like the same guy from Samui and the cops arrested the wrong guy over there. Same modus operandi.

Must be a TV member who read about the mistake from the first one in Koh Samui...

Next on the news: TV..for all your do's and don't to become a successful criminal... Lol

Who puts there Mobile/Cell phone in the hotels safety deposit boxes ??? would they not be using them

Senior member and living in thailand?

Well I hate to say it,

But Phuket is getting a pretty bad name, and now they blame it on foreigners????? Never have in a life time visited this part of the South, just always liked Issan..... But this is going beyond stupidity in reporting .....

Good posts, thanks all, and please watch your ass ok?????

Have a wonderful year!!!!!

Kilosierra

I don't believe the story. Never been to an hotel yet where you've needed to drug the receptionists. They seem to be able to fall asleep on their own!!

And the scumbag even had the presence of mind to remove the CCTV tape. Now, THAT's what I'd call professionalism. The supposedly foreign thief's local counterparts still have a lot to learn...

Yet a few detail in the story somehow don't add up:

The thief broke into 21 safety deposit boxes behind the counter. How long did that take and how shoddy were those locks? And were there no other people around in the lobby the entire time? Why did the receptionist accept a cup of coffee from a supposed non-guest? I mean, if the thief WERE a guest, the receptionist could have easily identified him and in which room he was/had been staying, and also his passport details would be on file.

I smell something fishy here... but that's perhaps just me, always suspicious.

Who puts there Mobile/Cell phone in the hotels safety deposit boxes ??? would they not be using them

When I first came to Thailand my cell not work here so I also put it in safety deposit box.

Farangs drugging Thais? That's a twist.

My understanding, farang refers to the westerners, especially the white ones.

Not sure that middle-easterners fall into this category.

Col Arun said the robber was “Middle East looking” with fair skin??????

I wonder what the receptionists cut was?

jb1

Sweeeet!!

Suppose it won't work twice, though??

...rule #1....do not ever believe anything a Thai person says...especially when a crime is involved.... (...you take it from there....)

Not quite sure why this should become a Phuket bashing thread. There are enough of those anyway.

This could have happened anywhere.

I know this hotel (in fact I nearly posted this story on TV on Tuesday when I knew about this but didn't for the sake of the hotel owners and guests). It's in a fairly quiet area, mostly frequented by Swedish and just inside there's a front desk with one security person and the safety lockers are right behind. I'd never looked to see how secure they seemed but the fact they were forced open (not mentioned in the story) implies not very. Rooms are quite a distance from the front desk so I can see how nobody heard anything. It was obviously a targeted robbery.

Room safes are far from perfect but are they a better option than security lockers at the front desk?

The logical explanation is that they were purchasing cheap pre-pay cell phones here and keeping their expensive phones from their perspective countries in the hotel safe deposit boxes.

Cell phones in North America typically do not allow interchangeable sim cards, they are dedicated to a specific provider.

oh well ... this happen everywhere in the world ..... but 3 millions bath in belonging 21 safe that makes 142,857 baht per safe .... pretty much a lot for such a small hotel .....with only one receptionist and no one around ..... strange to me .

i bet there will be so many insurance claims for deposit box contents..... most of which never existed...

this whole story sounds so very suspect

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

Inside job for sure !

Copycat is on the move !

Who is the owner of that hotel ??

And the scumbag even had the presence of mind to remove the CCTV tape. Now, THAT's what I'd call professionalism. The supposedly foreign thief's local counterparts still have a lot to learn...

Yet a few detail in the story somehow don't add up:

The thief broke into 21 safety deposit boxes behind the counter. How long did that take and how shoddy were those locks? And were there no other people around in the lobby the entire time? Why did the receptionist accept a cup of coffee from a supposed non-guest? I mean, if the thief WERE a guest, the receptionist could have easily identified him and in which room he was/had been staying, and also his passport details would be on file.

I smell something fishy here... but that's perhaps just me, always suspicious.

Kinda what I was thinking. I mean really, who gets a cup of coffee just randomly offered? "Here, drink this." So weird.

oh well ... this happen everywhere in the world ..... but 3 millions bath in belonging 21 safe that makes 142,857 baht per safe .... pretty much a lot for such a small hotel .....with only one receptionist and no one around ..... strange to me .

I hadn't done the maths. It does seem a lot.

I also have no idea whether this would be covered by insurance

The logical explanation is that they were purchasing cheap pre-pay cell phones here and keeping their expensive phones from their perspective countries in the hotel safe deposit boxes.

Cell phones in North America typically do not allow interchangeable sim cards, they are dedicated to a specific provider.

Well , i hate when providers sim-lock their phones,they usually did that here in DK some years ago,now all phones bought here is sim-free and you can put in all providers simcards,very usefull when in Thailand,and i always keep the phone on me,not in a stupid locker.

I don't believe the story. Never been to an hotel yet where you've needed to drug the receptionists. They seem to be able to fall asleep on their own!!

I've never been to a hotel where the receptionist would accept a cup of coffee from a guest.

The whole story sounds wrong to me.

There were 3 million THB in the guest deposit boxes and the hotel staff didn't steal it ?? And why would the guests keep that much in cash to start with? This story is full of holes.

I don't believe the story. Never been to an hotel yet where you've needed to drug the receptionists. They seem to be able to fall asleep on their own!!

I've never been to a hotel where the receptionist would accept a cup of coffee from a guest.

The whole story sounds wrong to me.

Security guard, not receptionist.

I don't know the scenario but not difficult to imagine how the perpetrator could gain a guard's confidence, walk around the corner to the 7-Eleven and return with a couple of coffees.

But it could just as well have involved collusion with the guard. If I find out more I will post it.

Most modern CCTV systems are now computer based with images stored on Hard Drive. To take away the 'recording' from the CCTV - he would need to dis-assemble the computer case and remove the Hard Drive. Surely this would be in the back office somewhere?

It may be possible they had a pre-historic CCTV system that runs on VHS tapes - in which case he can remove the tape in 2 seconds !

Also usually safety boxes have a twin key system or if one key - only the user has the key and if they lose the key they change the lock. However we don't know what they use there and of course it is possible that they were forced, in which case they can't have been very strong 'safety boxes'.

Room safes are usually cheap and nasty things and I have been to hotels where the room safe is not even secured to anything solid - just sat inside the wardrobe/closet.

Any form of security is only as good as the weakest link. No point having CCTV if the recording hardware is not in a secure room somewhere!

no doubt more info will be forthcoming and it will be interesting.