Thai police…starting to impress you as well?

[ozyjon]

A lot of catching up to do.

[seancbk]

All of my interactions with the Thai Police have been good.

A few years back a friend was murdered by his ex-wife's mother-in-law and the police apprehended her, the ex-wife and her brother very quickly.

I understand that most people only interact with traffic or street police, and at the lower levels they are annoying but go further up the chain and they are effective, professional and reliable.

What an arrogant and ignorant comment....you do know that Thailand is a strictly hierarchical society, as is the RTP, don't you ?

However, maybe you mean with...effective, professional and reliable...filling their own pockets.

How is my post arrogant? or ignorant for that matter. I've lived in Thailand for over 7 year and Asia for more than 40. I think I have a pretty good understanding of Thai society.

I didn't say the system was perfect, but I'm sick of hearing people say that the Thai Police are rubbish, when clearly many of them are not.

The whole 'filling their pockets' thing is a symptom of the Government not paying enough and that is a symptom of the society having not developed enough.

There will probably never be any real equality in Thailand and the police force will probably never get paid properly.

A police constable (the lowest rank) in Hong Kong earns HK$21,410 - $34,255 that is 96,988 - 155,175 THB per month

An officer earns between HK$40,225 - $76,275 - so up to 345,528 THB per month.

We both know that Thailand doesn't pay their police anything like that much, but until people in Thailand start getting paid equitably there will always be corruption.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

The point about fair compensation for Thai police and public employees is a legitimate one -- if it's teamed with serious penalties against corruption and serious enforcement of them (which is seriously unlikely to happen anytime in the foreseeable future).

But, it's meaningless to do a dollars to dollars comparison between police officer salaries in Thailand vs Hong Kong, given the substantial differences in cost of living and average wage rates between the two countries.

The main point should be: Thai police should be paid a fair salary and that's the ONLY compensation they should be legally allowed to receive, period. Dream on on the chances of that happening here....

Edited June 10, 2016 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[dageurreotype]

All of my interactions with the Thai Police have been good.

A few years back a friend was murdered by his ex-wife's mother-in-law and the police apprehended her, the ex-wife and her brother very quickly.

I understand that most people only interact with traffic or street police, and at the lower levels they are annoying but go further up the chain and they are effective, professional and reliable.

No, they're not. Having said that, I do know some very good station chiefs and conscientious police constables. But it's usually the rotten apple in a position of power that holds sway.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I understand that most people only interact with traffic or street police, and at the lower levels they are annoying but go further up the chain and they are effective, professional and reliable.

Like the ones who manage high-profile international murder cases such as the KT Brits.

Like the ones who take public reward monies and instead distribute them to the police.

Like the ones who made the former Southern human trafficking chief flee the country in fear for his life.

Like the ones just transferred out of Huay Kwang, apparently for taking backhanders.

Like the ones previously convicted of murder in connection with the Saudi Arabia case.

etc etc etc.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Like the ones previously convicted of murder in connection with the Saudi Arabia case.

I mis-spoke above. The group was charged with murder in the case, and then acquitted by a Criminal court in 2014, then an Appeals Court upheld the acquittals last May.

[opalred]

yes they are getting better

last time i was pulled up

he was smiling with his hand out

[seajae]

strangely enough on my way home today on a back road I came across 2 cops in their truck stopping everyone to check on them, no supervisor or signs up so it would appear to be a tea money exercise, looks like the old times are returning actually rather than the police getting better. Will wait and see if they are actually getting better, today showed me different.

[Stradavarius37]

No

[geriatrickid]

Can we focus on the question of whether or not people have noticed that the police have become more efficient in tracking down criminals?

The BIB-good vs. BIB-bad debate has been done to death on past threads.

They have not. Do you know what product placement is? How about PR Spin? A couple big announcements when literally hundreds of crimes go untouched on any given day is intended to distract from the shoddy unprofessional police work. Look at the crime laboratory. It's got some heavy duty problems and nothing has been addressed. Don't insult people's intelligence when you refer to DNA evidence. These are police who touch evidence with their hands and cannot protect a crime scene nor protect the integrity of evidence.

[berybert]

Can we focus on the question of whether or not people have noticed that the police have become more efficient in tracking down criminals?

The BIB-good vs. BIB-bad debate has been done to death on past threads.

Tracking criminals down is easy.

When a Thai official tells you that 50% of the jail population are scape goats then you can see just how easy.

[Shot]

When I was a kid, we would wave to the police driving down our street in hopes they would stop and talk with us. They almost always stopped, and said hello, and we would talk with them for several minutes. My friends and I wanted to be police because they were honorable citizens, family, friends, neighbors and well liked.

Here in Thailand, when my kids see police, they come inside.

[Dagnabbit]

Thai police have always been very goid at locating perps.

Obviously with the proviso that they havent been paid to not find them.

[gemguy]

I believe one has to understand that the capability of the police in many cases is based on their motivations.

They could do a much better job in many cases but I think the circumstances of each case has a lot to do with just how enthusiastically they do pursue and or resolve any crime case as they have the capabilities to do so, as often seen.

Meantime, I often imagine just how much work load they have relative to how many officers they can assign to any given case while tying to follow up on a myriad of cases pending and long before any new crime cases, as we are witnessing all sorts of crimes being perpetrated all the more so by the citizens, including the crimes committed by SOME of the police members themselves.

Then, of course just how much time can they spend on serving the public verses serving their own self serving corrupted agendas...such as collecting money from all the people they extort money from...lol

Yes they do often enough close a case and surprisingly quickly while you can only surmise there are some officers that are really good police men ...but they are often in conflict with other police officers and certainly their ranking officers when diligent police work exposes other police officers that are involved in crimes and nefarious corrupted activities.

Back in 1990 I once had a taxi driver tell me he used to be a police officer for 13 years before he quit and when asked why he told me:

He was honest, while working with too many other officers that turned corrupt at the drop of a coin and the main reason was, as he pointed out, it was relative to the low wages paid

He told me when he first started the salary was: 5,500 Baht per month and 13 years later his salary was 7,500 baht so he figured being a Taxi driver would pay more .

Plus he pointed out that driving a Cab allowed him to be free to do his own thing where as being a police officer you were on call 24 / 7 while he explained that at any time he would get calls to come and help with all kinds of stupid stuff like drunkards and domestic disputes and neighbors arguing and nasty and bloody road accident carnage at 3 am in the morning because his residence was nearer to the accident...so they would call him to come and assist...and all kinds of other police matters and responsibilities that just wore him down for the small wages.

Not an easy job ..so I can only surmise many of them figure they deserve to get as much money as they can regardless of the implications.

Cheers