A 50-year-old bull elephant was poisoned to death and its tusks cut off yesterday morning in Ayutthaya, police say.
Pol Maj Gen Sermkid Sitthichaikarn, Ayutthaya provincial police commander, and local authorities yesterday inspected the scene and found the body of a male elephant named Khlao yesterday near the Lop Buri River in Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya district.
Discovered near the body were blades and fastening nuts used in a portable electric saw as well as some bananas.
Police believed the bananas were laced with poison and used by the killers to feed the animal.
Mahout Phan Sala-ngam, 56, believed the jumbo, weighing 4.9 tonnes was poisoned with a strong toxic substance as it was thought to have collapsed very quickly after ingesting the poison.
The mahout said the elephant was chained to a tree beside the Lop Buri River in Moo 6 village of Baan Koh sub-district, opposite the Ayutthaya Royal Elephant Kraal or Wang Chang Ayutthaya Lae Paniat in Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya district on Thursday.
Mr Phan said it appeared the poachers were amateurs and had little knowledge about tusks as they cut off them off too short. Experts would have sawn off the tusks much closer to the base.
He suspected the killers might be local teenagers or drug addicts who wanted to sell the tusks for money or were hired to remove them.
Ayutthaya police said it was unclear how many people were involved in killing the elephant.
Police said Narate Wongkalung, 32, a former worker at Wang Chang Ayutthaya Lae Paniat, was arrested yesterday afternoon for questioning.
At the initial interrogation, he denied any involvement in the killing of the elephant.
The suspect allegedly admitted he was addicted to drugs and was recently sacked from Wang Chang Ayutthaya Lae Paniat.
Laithongrian Meephan, who owns an elephant named Kraal, said Khlao was an auspicious elephant which had once participated in a royal procession ceremony to give offerings to His Majesty in Ayutthaya’s Thung Makham Yong area.
The male elephant had appeared in the Hollywood movie, Alexander the Great, part of which was filmed in Thailand.
Mr Laithongrian said the elephant was worth more than 4 million baht.
An autopsy was being performed by a team of veterinarians.
Food found in its stomach was taken for further examination for toxicity to establish which poison was used.
Mr Laithongrian said the spread of drug addiction in the province among some of the mahouts in Ayutthaya has become a cause for serious concern.
The body of Khlao was buried yesterday as monks were invited to perform a religious ceremony as it was believed that the event would allow the dead jumbo to rest in peace.
A group of foreign volunteers who have been trained to take care of elephants in Wang Chang Ayutthaya Lae Paniat had photos taken with the dead jumbo and shared them on social media.
