A 22-year-old female student was rescued by police from a hotel in Bangkok’s Lat Phrao area on Thursday, after she was lured there by a call centre scammer and told to inform her parents that she had been kidnapped and would be freed for a payment of 200,000 baht.
The kidnap plot was exposed when the student’s parents filed a complaint with Bang Phli district police yesterday, saying that they had lost contact with their daughter since 7pm Wednesday night and that she might be in danger, according to Pol Maj-Gen Wichit Boonchinwuthikul, the commander of Samut Prakan provincial police.
Detectives then questioned the student’s relatives and were told that she had asked her parents to wire a total of 350,000 baht, in instalments of 50,000, 200,000 and 100,000 baht, to ‘Thirasak’, claiming that she had won a scholarship to study abroad, but she needed the money for registration and insurance coverage. She was also tricked into leaving her hostel for an unknown destination.
According to the police investigation, the scammer initially called the student, accused her of being involved in money laundering and demanded that she report to Chiang Mai police. When the student claimed that she could not travel to Chiang Mai, the scammer suggested she get a room in a hotel in Lat Phrao’s Wang Thong Lang in Bangkok.
Police said the scammer VDO-called to her every day for about a week, during which they forced her to ask her parents to send the money, which was ultimately wired into Thirasak’s account.
Police finally managed to locate her and sought a search warrant for the hotel room. Police say that the student refused to open the door when the officers arrived at the hotel, forcing them to get a spare key from hotel staff. They found the student talking with the scammer on a video call.
They also said that the student was forced to talk with several scammers for more than 17 hours non-stop and they were still talking when they opened the hotel room.
