Riding on garbage trucks and disguised as garbage collectors, anti-narcotics police gained access to a tightly knit community in Bangkok’s Prawet district and arrested an alleged drug network leader who had eluded them for weeks, police said.
The operation, dubbed “Garbage Truck Undercover”, involved more than 50 officers from the Metropolitan Police Bureau’s Narcotics Suppression Centre and the Office of the Narcotics Control Board (ONCB).
The operation resulted in the arrest of six alleged members of the network and the identification of nine drug users in a community in Soi On Nut, who were subsequently taken for rehabilitation, police said.
The main target was 38-year-old ‘Somphop’, also known as ‘Bang Dam’, a Prawet resident who was arrested at a rented house in Phraeksa subdistrict, Mueang district, Samut Prakan, under an arrest warrant.
He faces charges of jointly distributing Category 1 narcotics, including methamphetamine and crystal methamphetamine, possessing ketamine without permission, and conspiracy to commit serious drug offences, according to police.
The charges stem from an investigation into the distribution of 120,000 methamphetamine pills in the Prawet area.
Police seized 1,644 pills, 63 grammes of crystal methamphetamine, 2.5 grammes of ketamine, five mobile phones, one Toyota car and five motorcycles during the operation.
Police said several drug cases led investigators to Somphop, who allegedly operated a drug-trafficking network in Prawet. They had initially, however, struggled to identify and locate him.
The area’s narrow and complicated alleys, together with the close-knit nature of the community, made it difficult for undercover officers to operate without being detected.
Police said residents were mostly relatives or acquaintances and would alert each other when they spotted strangers.
Drug transactions were also allegedly arranged in an overgrown rubbish dump in the area, further complicating police efforts to conduct surveillance.
Police therefore developed an undercover operation in which officers disguised themselves as garbage collectors and rode garbage trucks into the community without arousing suspicion.
Pol Maj Gen Teeradet Thammasuthee, deputy commissioner of the Metropolitan Police responsible for illegal narcotics suppression, and Prin Mekhanan, director of the Bangkok ONCB office, led the operation yesterday.
Officers searched five locations in Bangkok and Samut Prakan under court warrants.
Five alleged members of Somphop’s network were arrested in the initial searches, and evidence gathered during the investigation allegedly linked them to him.
Investigators later received information from an informant that led them to Somphop’s rented house in Phraeksa, where he was arrested.
During his arrest, Somphop denied all the charges. He reportedly told officers that he did not know why he had been arrested and denied any involvement with drugs.
Main photo: The garbage collectors seen in the photo are actually police officers working undercover to arrest an alleged drug ring leader in Bangkok’s Prawet district.
