Thailand mass murderer shot in backyard and praised previous attacks

Panya Kamrab, the former police officer who last week shot and stabbed 36 people, including 22 children, to death in Thailand in the Southeast Asian country’s worst such massacre, had a history of violence, according to information gathered from neighbors and former officials. 34 year old male coworkers.

On several nights, people who lived close to him said they heard gunshots being fired in his backyard with his 9mm pistol, one of the weapons used by Kamrab in the attack carried out in the city of Uthai Sawan, 500 kilometers from the capital Bangkok.

“How were we going to report him to the police? He was the police,” said Phuwan Polyeam, 29, one of the neighbors, who lives with two children. The former policeman lived in the northeastern province of Nong Bua Lamphu with his girlfriend and son – who he also murdered.

Kamrab grew up in the village of Tha Uthai and won a place at a law school in Bangkok. He joined the police and in 2020 he returned to his homeland. Earlier this year, he was expelled from the corporation for drug possession — and was facing a lawsuit.

Initially, it was believed that the police officer might have been under the influence of substances such as methamphetamine at the time of the crime. The autopsy performed on the day of the murders, last Thursday (6), however, did not find any traces of drugs.

Thai deputy chief of police, General Surachate Hakparn, told Reuters the crime resulted from an “explosive emotion”, pointing to the accumulation of problems Kamrab faced – from firing the police to legal, financial and family problems.

On the same day as the massacre, the former police officer had a hearing in a local court on the drug possession charge. The sentence of his case would be announced the next day. Upon returning home, according to reports from people close to him, he would not have found his girlfriend – who, earlier, would have informed him of the end of the relationship.

From there, Kamrab climbed into his truck and began the series of murders, which began with the shooting death of a man who was on a motorcycle next to him. In all, the sequence of attacks lasted at least 3 hours, according to a reconstruction made by Reuters. There are accumulating reports of delays in police action.

According to a report by the deputy chief of a neighboring village to local media, Kamrab had previously praised a massacre that took place in 2020, when a soldier shot dead 29 people and wounded 57 others at four locations in the town of Nakhon Ratchasima. The ex-cop reportedly said that if he had been the shooter, he would have killed even more people.

Another neighbor told Reuters that days before the attack, the village chief reached out to Kamrab to warn him that his behavior had been bothering residents. They then argued, and the chief, who declined to comment, walked away for fear of some violent act.

The largest number of victims of the former officer is in a day care center in the region, where Kamrab stabbed even children who were sleeping. At the time, he would have used a kind of blade that local farmers use to work crops – in the region, rice and sugar cane fields are common.

From the daycare, he returned close to his home, where he was questioned by neighbors – at least two were killed. Then he set fire to his truck, killed his girlfriend and son, and shot himself.

One of the residents, Suwan, said she hid at home with her two children, asking them to be silent. She called the police more than once for help. “They said there weren’t enough police; it took a while,” the Thai woman said.

The country, led by Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-Ocha, is now seeking to review its rules for possession of weapons – Kamrab had acquired the pistol legally – and strengthen the fight against drug trafficking.