Activist in Thailand Accuses Police of Operating Unlicensed Gambling Websites

On Monday, the individual appeared at the Royal Thai Police’s headquarters and made a public admission that dishonest police were engaged in unlawful gaming.

According to the Bangkok Post, Achariya Ruangrattanapong publicly denounced what he claims to be the involvement of senior police officers and an ex-national police chief in the widespread use of illegal gambling websites in Thailand.

100 or more Police Officers Participate in Illegal Gambling
Achariya displayed a banner to the journalists on which he had written down the names of the allegedly dishonest police personnel. In an effort to defuse the situation, police intervened and instructed the activist to remove the poster from the offices’ outside. Yet the activist is far from finished. He warned that while the network of those truly involved is far deeper and has at least 100 involved police officers, his Monday appearance only exposed 16 of them.

He acknowledged that he now intended to reveal the other names as well. Achariya claims that the former police chief genuinely controlled 70% of the gambling websites that were currently active in Thailand and that he gave police lieutenant generals a large amount of the responsibility for administering the organization on a daily basis.

Achariya provided a startling amount of information about the alleged operation, including the names of people who are thought to be running some of the websites—some of whom are Chinese nationals—as well as the methods used to conceal the source of the illegal proceeds and the laundering of those funds. Part of this was done with the aid of a soccer club. According to Achariya, the club’s directors were actually owners of gambling websites and police offers.

More Whistleblowers in Thailand Come Up About Police Corruption
He is not the first person who has accused corrupt police personnel of promoting illicit gambling in Thailand. He really makes the same claims as Chuvit Kamolvisit, who also asserts that senior police personnel have participated in a number of illegal gambling activities. Although there hasn’t been any more investigation into these claims, Achariya and Kamolvisit’s charges are too particular to be disregarded.