BERT AT BANGKWANG 2006

Hi, I am a fellow prisoner of Steve Willcox also serving time in Bangkwang on drugs offences.

Steve asked me if I would like to contribute anything to his web site which I am more than happy to do. I hope that you find some of my writing of interest, but please keep in mind that we are both rank amateurs at this sort of thing and I apologize now for any of the mistakes that are bound to occur. For family reasons I have decided to use a “Pen Name” when writing for Steve’s site, but if you wish to contact me at all, you can do so using Steve’s contact details on this site and he will pass any correspondence on to me. I would be very happy to answer any questions you may have and will reply to all letters sent. And besides, I could really do with some Pen Pals anyway!

PLEASE MAKE THE EFFORT TO SIGN STEV’S PETITION AS IN THE LONG RUN IT COULD HELP US ALL OUT.

 

Thank you and read on!!

                                                Bert Bratoo

 

 

GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER

The Brutal rape and murder of British backpacker Catherine Horton on the idyllic island of Koh Samui,Thailand, on new years eve has shocked the nation. Catherine, 21 was sharing a cheap beachside bungalow with a friend at the popular resort of Lamai Beach when she was attacked as she strolled alone after dark on the beach chatting with her mum, at home in the UK, by mobile phone. Catherine’s body was discovered later in the surf and the subsequent police investigation revealed that a violent struggle had taken place during which she had been raped, bludgeoned to death and her body thrown into the sea.

Much of the British public will have been jubilant in recent days to learn that two Thai Fishermen who had jointly confessed to the murder have been handed down the maximum death sentence by a Thai court on the island.

But what of this seemingly appropriate sentence? Will these monsters ever actually see the day when they will be dragged kicking and screaming in front of the firing squad to pay for their heinous crime? Or will they, along with hundreds of other convicted murderers, rapists, child sex fiends and their like spend a relatively short period of time incarcerated before they are released back into society as free men?

The brief answers to those questions are as follows.

No, the chances of these two animals ever being executed are minute, almost no chance of getting what they deserve at all.

And yes, they will eventually be released from prison, and in a much shorter period of time than common sense dictates. In fact, compared to the lengths of time that drug offenders are expected to serve in Thai prisons, these two despicable pieces of human trash haven’t a care in the world. They can basically ‘Kick Back’ and enjoy the ride for a few years until their sentences have been so dramatically reduced through regular, sometimes annual, amnesties given to all prisoners in Thailand (except narcotics cases) and will find that in really no time at all (when compared to their crime) they will become ‘Time Served’ and released back into society and freedom, none the worse for wear, perhaps just a little older but certainly not rehabilitated or educated.

As is the case with many third world countries, the Thai Justice System has introduced very little in the way of remission or parole in administering burgeoning 350.000 plus prison population. Instead it uses a system of Royal Decrees, Amnesties and individual Royal Pardons acting as a ‘Relief valve’ to ease the pressure on it’s severely overcrowded prisons and also to provide some measure of hope to it’s prisoners that through general amnesties they may someday return to a life back in society. Prisoners in Thailand are serving some of the severest sentences in the world.

For example, once a prisoner is sentenced by the courts to say, 50 years, he will be expected to serve that full sentence and his only hope of having his sentence reduced is by receiving as part of a general amnesty or by personally petitioning the king for clemency or a full pardon.

General amnesties are given on auspicious royal occasions such as the king’s birthday or other special anniversary’s and may be granted quite regularly, sometimes as much as once a year. The amnesties are given to all prisoners no matter what their crime – unless that is you have been convicted on any drug charges. Murderers, rapist’s, child sex offenders, they all qualify for amnesty cuts in their sentences. Drug offenders on the other hand, rarely qualify for any cuts at all. Amnesties for drug offenders average about once every 10 years. And then the cut will be of a much smaller proportion to their sentence than other offenders. For example in the recent past when other offenders have been granted a 50% cut in their sentence, drug offenders, if they have been lucky enough to be included at all, have only enjoyed cuts of  around 15% of their time to serve.

But let’s return to Catherine’s murderers and their death sentences! The most likely scenario will actually be something of this order:

They will have been sentenced to death by the first court only. There still remain two more courts, the appellate court and the Supreme Court in which their sentences have a good chance of being reduced to life. The simple fact that the accused confessed the crime and pleaded guilty to the charges allows either of these courts to drop the punishment to ‘Life Imprisonment’ within the law.

Should the death sentence be upheld in these latter two courts they can still petition the King for clemency. The King of Thailand is a devout Buddhist and is the supreme Patriarch of the Buddhist in Thailand. When petitioned to do so he will always grant a stay of execution and the petitioner’s sentence will be reduced to ‘Life’. Once that has happened the prisoners case will be declared closed in the courts and he will now be eligible for any amnesty that is granted. It would of course take a number of years to reach the stage of partitioning the King for clemency but lets not forget that they cannot be executed during this time and besides their chances for getting a reduction in the appeal or supreme courts are excellent which would make them eligible for amnesty at a much earlier stage.

Whenever they become eligible, the first amnesty declared after that will probably give them a 50% cut in their sentence, but because they are on ‘Life’ this first amnesty will reduce them to 40 years remaining. From then on its plain sailing, with every amnesty, is bringing them down another half of their remaining sentence. From 40 years to 20 years. Then 20 years to only ten years. If you take into account the time it will take for these two pieces of trash to get through the court system and the frequencies of amnesties it is not hard to calculate that even if they remained on ‘Death’ after supreme court, they could quite easily find themselves free men, turned back onto the street within 12-15 years. Not a bad deal for a pair of downright evil twisted fucks who were sentenced to die for their crimes.

To be sentenced to death for murder in Thailand is quite unusual, the death sentence is usually reserved for drug cases, and the damage done to Thailand’s Tourist Industry would have been foremost in the judge’s mind as he handed down the sentence. He knew that the world would be watching, and acted accordingly. 6 months from now, this terrible crime will be forgotten by all expect Catherine’s loved ones.

Making enquiries recently I have discovered that the longest serving murderer still here has served 17 years and is due to be released in June. Meanwhile there are many drugs case prisoners here that are moving into ten’s of year’s remaining on their sentence.

YOU FIGURE IT OUT, I CANT?

 

                                     By Bert Bratoo Bangkwang 2006