Police have sought court approval to arrest a 59-year-old man and two accomplices for the theft of a 10-million-baht diamond from a gem-broker who took it to a shop in Bangkok’s Bang Rak district on Tuesday.
Pol Lt Chanachart Charoenphol, deputy investigation chief at Bang Rak police station, filed a request at the South Bangkok Criminal Court for arrest warrants for Pipatpongpat Suksawatpipat and two others, Thai media reported.
The heist occurred at a shop on the first floor of a four-storey commercial building on Si Phraya Road around 3pm on Tuesday.
A man police believe to be Mr Pipatpongpat had lured an Indian gem broker to the shop, which he had arranged to rent only the previous week.
Jain Vaivphav, 44, and a Thai friend arrived with a 10-carat diamond they reportedly had advertised for sale over the web.
After seating them in the shop, the man said he wanted to examine the stone in natural light. He walked outside the shop, then closed and locked the glass door behind him and took off on a waiting motorbike, leaving the two men trapped inside.
Mr Vaivphav susained severe lacerations breaking the glass door with his fist to get out, but was too late to stop them escaping.
On Thursday, he showed police investigators a certificate valuing the diamond at 10 million baht.
Investigators were also trying to understand why Mr Vaivphav had thought to sell such a valuable gem to a shop which had no history and no credibility.
Thai media reported on Thursday that he had taken the diamond to the shop for cutting and polishing, not for sale as earlier reported.
Mr Pipatpongpat has a criminal record, according to the reports. In 2007 he was charged with an offence involving an ID card in Phetchabun province. In 2008, he was charged with theft in Thaling Chan and Bang Phong Phang areas of Bangkok, and with a similar offence in 2015 in Chanthaburi. He had been released after serving a prison term.
He had changed his name four times, the reports said.
Police inspect the shop opened by the thief as a front to steal a 10 million-baht diamond from an Indian gem broker who advertised it for sale on a website, in Bang Rak district, Bangkok, on Tuesday. The glass door was broken by the desperate gem seller after he and his companion were locked inside when the thief fled. (Photo taken from TV)
