Crime

Mystery Surrounds Wirral Millionaire David Farrell’s Death

Wirral millionaire David Farrell

Chiangrai Times – A police investigation is currently probing whether 72-year-old David Farrell – who was found naked with bruises on his body – was murdered or the victim of a tragic accident.

His daughters, who flew to Thailand to say their final goodbyes to their dad, suspect foul play.

Lois and Nikki Farrell are particularly concerned about the changing of the will and said they cannot rest until they get to the bottom of what happened to their dad.

Apparently David Farrell changed his will four days before he was found dead in his luxury home in Thailand

Mr Farrell’s body was discovered in his Pattaya home and he was cremated in a three-day funeral there.

His daughters and the Thai police are awaiting the results of a post mortem.

But Nikki, who runs a hairdressing business, said: “We have a British lawyer in Pattaya who is trying to help us get to the bottom of what went on.

“The police are swaying towards it being an accident, trying to say he was in bad health, but we have a medical report which says otherwise. Three weeks before his death he had an MoT at Bangkok hospital which gave him a clean bill of heath.

“I spoke to my father on a Wednesday and he was fine. He died on the following Monday. When I spoke to him he was quite worried. He said he had big problems but did not specify what they were.

“He said he went to hospital with chest pains because he thought he was having a heart attack but got the all-clear. They said it was stress.

“From our conversation I was in no doubt he meant his problems were not health problems – something else was going on.”

The sisers plan to return to Thailand to see if they can gather any more clues as to how Mr Farrell.

They said a visit to their dad’s house had already unearthed findings which did not add up to his death being accidental.

They brought Mr Farrell’s ashes home and plan to have a memorial service for him in Wirral.

Police from Sattahip police station, in Chonburi province, were said to have been notified of Mr Farrell’s death at around 2.30pm on Monday July 30.

Mr Farrell lived in the Baan Bang Saray market area of Pattaya in a three-storey house with a swimming pool.

Nikki said an early morning phone call from his ex-wife Koranit Chuangchai, 33, gave her the devastating news.

She said: “It was 6.45am here, about 1pm in dad’s part of Thailand. The call was from his ex-wife to say he had been found dead. I was violently sick. I could not speak. It was a big shock.”

The sisters said their dad’s body was discovered by an English friend and neighbour who became concerned when they did not see Mr Farrell as they usually did on a Saturday.

When the neighbour knocked and got no answer on Monday he climbed over a wall and found Mr Farrell’s body.

Mr Farrell lived in a sleepy fishing village south of the main resort of Pattaya.

His daughters said he fell in love with Thailand after going there on holiday with a friend he worked with at Liverpool’s Stanley Dock market.

He met a Thai nurse and, with his children grown up and his parents no longer around to look after, they got married about six years ago.

The couple had a daughter, Lucinda Edith, who will be four in October, but split three months before he died.

Mr Farrell grew up in Gloucester Road, Wallasey, and worked as a roofer for the family business W.H. Farrell Roofing and Building. He later became a succcessful property developer.

Nikki said her dad, a grandfather-of-four who also lived in Wellington Road, New Brighton, and Seabank Road, Wallasey, was well known in Wirral, especially during the 1960s. He drove a Rolls Royce and people sometimes mistook him for George Best.

She said: “He thought he was a rock star. Women threw themselves at him. He even signed autographs as George Best. He had a big fur coat. He was once mistaken for John Lennon because of his Rolls Royce.

“But despite that he was also shy and reserved. He was a very private man. He was loyal. He had a wide circle of people he knew but was only close to a couple of friends.”

Lois, who works with children with disabilities for Wiral council, said the emotional toll his death had taken on the family was “horrendous”.

She added: “He was young at heart. He loved good food and wine. He was just our dad. I went over to see him every year.

“It is horrendous. I needed to go over and see it to believe it.

“The thought he could have been murdered just fills me with horror. We will never give up searching for answers.”

Crime

Police Officer Being Ordained at Temple Arrested for Running Scam Call Center

Police in Northern Thailand have arrested a fellow officer as he was being ordained at a temple in Ngao district of neighbouring Lampang province.

Pol Lt Col Bandit Khonkan chief inspector from the Hang Dong police station was disrobed and taken to the Chang Puak station in Chiang Mai. He was arrested on charges of running a call centre scam gang in Chiang Mai Province.

According to Thai Media Chiang Mai Provincial Police Region 5 obtained an arrest warrant for Pol Lt Col Bandit on Friday from the Chiang Mai Provincial Court for procuring illegal telecom equipment, setting up a station and using public airwaves to run a telecommunications business without permission.

Pol Lt Col Bandit reportedly told investigators that he was not the ringleader and was only a member of the gang with Chinese partners.

His arrest followed the apprehension of his 26-year-old daughter, Miss Wanuchapond, 26, and three others during raids at three housing projects in Chiang Mai on Friday, Pol Maj Gen Weerachon Boontawee, deputy chief of Provincial Police Region 5 told Thai media.

During the raids police police discovered around 12 GSM gateways, or SIM boxes, which are devices used for converting cellular networks into mobile phone numbers used domestically.

The chief inspectors daughter Miss Wanuchapond told the arresting officers that she was paid 8,000 baht a month at each of the three locations for renting thr rooms and monitoring devices.

She claimed she had no idea what the devices were and accepted the job because the pay was attractive.

Police investigators working with telecom regulators used a special tracking device to monitor the gang’s communications and learned that its base was in Myanmar opposite Mae Sai district of Chiang Rai.

The call center gang used the GSM gateways to make calls over the internet to scam people in Thailand out of million of baht.

The GSM gateways transmitting signals via SIM boxes to convert them into domestic phone numbers, duping victims into thinking they were being called from Thai government agencies.

Pol Maj Gen Weerachon said that each SIM box held 32 SIM cards, with a capacity of up to 300,000 calls a month. The seized devices had made fraudulent calls over 3.6 million times.

He said the their investigation is ongoing and they are working to track down the remaining conspirators, including Chinese and other Thai suspects.

Authorities are still deciding whether Pol Lt Col Bandit will be dismissed from the force, he said, adding that so far, no other officers are known to have been involved.

Police in Chiang Rai Launch Crackdown on Cyber Criminals in Golden Triangle

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Settha Thavisin has authorized the establishment of an emergency cyber center operated by the Royal Thai Police to combat transnational crimes committed by call center gangs along the Thai border in Chiang Rai province.

On July 19, Prime Minister Settha Thavisin directed the Center to combat information technology crimes. The Royal Thai Police (Royal Thai Police) will crack down on call center gangs in Myanmar, Laos, and along the border.

His directive comes as call center gangs ratchet up their scams to defraud people of their money, causing concern among Thais and jeopardizing the country’s economic and social stability.

Related Police News:

Machete Wielding Man Shot an Killed by Police in Chiang Rai

https://www.chiangraitimes.com/chiangrai-news/machete-wielding-man-shot-an-killed-by-police-in-chiang-rai/

Crime

Thai Immigration Police Arrest Colombian Tourists Over Home Invasions

Immigration police officers have arrested four Colombian nationals in connection with a series of home burglaries at luxury housing complexes in the Bangkok metropolitan area and Chiang Buri Province.

Pol Maj Gen Panthana Nuchanart, deputy commissioner of the Immigration Bureau, told a press briefing that three of the suspects were apprehended in Nonthaburi Province and the fourth in South Pattaya, Chon Buri Province.

According to the Bangkok Post, the Colombians were charged with stealing conspiracy and seized around 3 million baht (US$82,500.00).

According to Pol Maj Gen Panthana, the criminals rode motorcycles through housing estates, scoping out the properties and waiting for the owners to depart before committing their crimes.

He stated that all four of the accused denied any involvement in the home break-ins, but the arresting squad discovered evidence that implicated them.

Police called to home invasion

Meanwhile, police were dispatched to a luxury housing development in Tambon Nong Prue, Chonburi Province, after a Chinese man was attacked during a house invasion.

When they arrived, they discovered the house owner, Mr. Qian Peng Yi, visibly scared and with marks from being tied up with a cable. He informed police that three Chinese males broke into his home at 9 p.m., one of whom brandished a gun at him and directed him to his bedroom.

They bound his hands and feet, gagged him with fabric, taped his head, and forced him into the bed. The intruders then attempted to compel him into transferring 10 million baht in cryptocurrencies to them, endangering the life of his 33-year-old cousin who was in a second-floor bedroom.

While they scoured the house in search of riches, Mr. Peng Yi managed to flee and hide; he subsequently observed them leave with his cousin. Officials investigated the property and analyzed security camera footage from the incident and surrounding areas.

Around 9 p.m., a 30-year-old van driver came at the Bang Lamung police station after being contacted by an agency to carry Chinese customers from Pattaya to Suvarnabhumi Airport.

The driver informed authorities that he was supposed to pick them up at a motel about a kilometer from the Chinese businessman’s home. He then drove them to Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport, arriving at 1 a.m. and receiving 1,800 baht.

The driver took a snapshot of the group smoking at the airport gate and identified one of them as the victim’s cousin. Police suspected coordination between her and the three suspects in her cousin’s heist, who all departed Thailand on the same aircraft.

Other Bangkok News:

Police in Bangkok Discover Six Vietnamese Tourists Dead in 5 Star Hotel

Police in Bangkok Discover Six Vietnamese Tourists Dead in 5 Star Hotel

Crime

Son of Thailand’s Leading Legal Scholar on Corruption Arrested for Running Online Gambling Network

The son of a former senator and leading economist and expert on corruption and gambling in Thailand has been arrested for on charges of running an online gambling network and its payment system.

Police from Thailand’s Technology Crime Suppression Division (TCSD) have confiscated assets worth more than (US$ 11.1 million) 400 million baht.

Narote Piriyarangsan, 33, was arrested following crackdowns in three sites around the city, according to Pol Maj Gen Athip Pongsiwapai, commander of the police Technology Crime Suppression Division (TCSD).

Mr Narote’s father, Sangsit Piriyarangsan, is an economist who has written articles and books about corruption and gambling. He was one of the appointed senators that were investigating the government’s intention to legalize casino gaming before their terms expired.

Police also detained 39-year-old Narayut Narakaew, the owner of the gambling website 69pgslot.com. The Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for the couple for operating an internet gambling service and money laundering.

According to the Bangkok Post, police seized two desktop computers, one laptop computer, 14 mobile phones, 21 bank passbooks, 53 ATM cards, and four high-end cars — a Ferrari 926 GTS, an Aston Martin, a Lexus, and a Subaru — totaling more than 400 million baht.

Police launched the inquiry after discovering the online gambling site, which accepted funds via an automatic deposit-withdrawal system through bank accounts and deposits in the AskMePay system. Players scanned the VPay QR code as well as the QR codes for Heng Online 888 or Heng Pay Company.

Police also discovered that payments received via QR code scans were transferred to the account of Heng Pay Co and then to the gambling website’s mule accounts using AskMePay, which did not use banks’ face recognition scanning. An inquiry indicated a monthly turnover of approximately 5 billion baht.

According to investigators, the website has been up and running for around four years, with the payment mechanism in use for roughly eight months.

According to Pol Maj Gen Athip, Mr Narote owns the gaming website’s payment systems and is the director of Heng Pay Co. After gathering evidence, authorities requested arrest warrants for 14 people.

Thailand does not allow almost any kind of gaming. Even though the law doesn’t say anything specific about online gaming, it is still considered gambling. The country has pretty strict rules about gambling. Thai punters can bet on the national lottery and horse races, but they can’t bet on any other types of games.

But it’s not a secret that there is a huge illegal gaming business in Thailand, even though it’s illegal.

The illegal casinos, online betting shops, underground lotteries, and pop-up bookies that take bets on everything from cockfights to Muay Thai make a shadow economy that is worth billions of dollars every year.