THAILAND: All Hua Hin Tourist Attackers Arrested

Hua Hin police stand behind two suspects (seated), who were arrested following an assault on an elderly British couple and their son. The tourists were savagely attacked during a family vacation in Prachuap Khiri Khan.

Four men have been arrested for a savage attack on an elderly British family holidaying in Hua Hin over the Songkran holiday after a video of the incident went viral on the internet.

The video, captured by overhead security cameras and posted this week on social media, sparked shock and outrage over its brutality and the ages of the victims: a 65-year-old woman and a 68-year-old man from Scotland.

"All four suspects have now been arrested," Pol Col Chaiyakorn Sriladecho, chief of Hua Hin police, said Thursday afternoon.

Suphatra Baithong, Yingyai Saengkham-in, both aged 32, and Siwa Noksri, 20, were captured within days of the assault while Chaiya Jaiboon, 20, was apprehended today.

They all are expected to appear in court before next week.

"The men say they are sorry and that they wouldn't have done this if they weren't drunk," he added.

In the clip, the family is seen walking in front of Wat Hua Hin on Soi Bintabaht around 1.30am on April 13 amid festivities for the Thai New Year.

An altercation breaks out with a group of men on the street who punch all three in the face, kick their bodies and stomp on their faces in an attack that lasts about two minutes.

The attack stops only when all three victims are seen lying apparently unconscious on the ground. As the gang disappears, bystanders come to their aid.

Pol Col Chaiyakorn said the attack started after "the son accidentally bumped into one of the Thai men".

Lewis Owen, 68, and his son John, 43, suffered head injuries requiring stitches, he said. Rosemary Owen, 65, was more severely injured, suffering a build-up of fluid in the brain that was removed, he said.

"The hospital is still holding her for observation for serious head and eye injuries," said Pol Col Chaiyakorn.

The incident just made the headlines in Thailand after the British media, namely The Telegraph, Daily Mail and Mirror, reported it on Wednesday.
The attack is just the latest brutal assault on foreign tourists, which contribute to 10% of the country's gross domestic product.

In March, four French tourists were assaulted on the island of Koh Kut as they walked to dinner. Among them were a mother and daughter who were both raped.

Two British backpackers were murdered on Koh Tao in 2014. Autopsies showed the couple, a young man and woman, had been severely beaten and the woman raped.

Two Myanmar migrants were convicted of the crime based on DNA evidence that rights groups say was questionable.

THAILAND: British Tourist FamilyAttacked In Hua Hin

A British couple and their son who were attacked during a family holiday in Thailand say they will never return to the country.

Shocking footage has emerged of what is reported to be a British family being attacked in Thailand, apparently because they were western tourists.

The couple and their adult son were leaving a bar in the Hua Hin province in the early hours of April 13 after celebrating Thai New Year, News.com.au reports, when they were attacked by a gang of young men.

“At one point the mother, believed to be in her 60s or 70s, tried to sit back up and was kicked in the jaw causing her to fall unconscious.

British media is reporting that one eyewitness who intervened had claimed in an online forum that the gang deliberately targeted Western tourists.

Police have arrested three people in connection with the attack, local Police Chief Chayakorn Siradecho said.

Thai police are hunting the last suspect seen assaulting the family and leaving them apparently unconscious on the street.

“We are now looking for the last suspect and we have a warrant out for his arrest” on assault charges, he said.

The condition of the three victims is unknown.

CCTV footage of the incident has gone viral online.

Thailand’s reputation as a tourist haven has suffered a setback over the past several years, due to incidents including the high-profile murders of two British backpackers on the resort of Koh Tao in 2014 and a bombing at a popular Bangkok tourist site in August that killed 20 people.