Woman Tourist Killed By Bag Snatchers

[Flashermac]

PHUKET - An Australian woman died after being knifed on Wednesday night during an attempted bag-snatch by two men on a motorcycle, police said.

 

The woman was identified as Michelle Elizabeth Smith, 60, a member of a group of 10 travel agents visiting Phuket to inspect a five-star resort.

 

The attack occurred about 10.30pm when Smith and her friend, Lynn Tammee Lee, were walking back to their hotel after having dinner.

 

Lee, who suffered a slash wound to her right arm during the attack, told police that the two men, aged about 18 to 25, drove past them twice before one of them tried to snatch Smith's bag.

 

As Smith struggled to hold on to the bag one of the men stabbed her in the chest. She was pierced through the heart and died at the scene.

 

The motorcycle thugs fled empty handed.

 

Police were tracking them down.

According to Phuket Wan website, a surveillance camera captured grainy photos of the two assailants but the licence plate of their motorcycle was indistinguishable.

 

My link

 

 

[Flashermac]

Phuket Tourists Tell of 'Horrible Screams' as Perth Mother is Killed

PHUKET: Three Australian women talked today about hearing screams last night as a woman from Perth was knifed and killed in the street outside a Phuket resort.

 

The women, all from Sydney, plan to take precautions after learning how Perth mother Michelle Smith died in a savage attempt at a bag snatch that went horribly wrong.

 

Police all over Phuket were today hunting the two young men who murdered the 60-year-old travel agent for nothing and wounded her companion, Lynn Tammee Lee.

 

Ms Lee and the other travel agents on the familiarisation tour of Phuket were checking out of the five-star Katathani Beach Resort today and heading for home.

Outside the resort today, Jenni Thuge, her mother Dianne and Rebecca Edgell, all from Cronulla in Sydney, told of their shock at hearing the piercing screams as the two women were attacked last night about 10.30pm.

 

''I heard someone screaming loudly and yelling 'Help, help,'' Jenni Thuge said. ''It was horrible.''

 

Ms Thuge turns 40 on Saturday and is on Phuket with her mother and a dozen friends for a week-long holiday celebration.

 

Her mother Dianne said: ''We read the news this morning and were shocked. We couldn't believe that this could happen. Phuket is such a pleasant place.''

 

Rebeccas Edgell said: ''We've decided to not carry bags just to play safe, although I forgot and brought mine with me just now.''

 

The women are determined not to let the tragedy of last night ruin their long-planned holiday. ''We read about drink-spiking in Bali and decided to come to Phuket instead.''

 

Her mother added: ''These things can happen in Parramatta Road. We just feel so sorry for the poor woman. But it's hard to blame Phuket.''

 

The mood was sombre inside the busy resort in just one corner of the lobby as the travel agents prepared to head straight back to Perth. They were reluctant to talk to the media and grieving for their companion.

 

Elsewhere, though, hundreds of guests enjoyed the swimming pools or headed for a walk along the Kata Noi beach. Resort managers said the Katathani is full and about 80 percent occupied by Australians.

 

Australian honorary consul Larry Cunningham was meeting with police and the tour group in private, with a media conference promised for 2pm local time.

 

Local Saitong Jankeaw, aged 40, sells popular pappaya salad close to the spot where Mrs Smith collapsed to the ground last night with a long knife slash to her heart.

 

''My husband Mr Preeya heard the screams. We were afraid to go out to help, it was so loud and frightening. I asked him whether we should go out but he said 'Maybe it's better not to go.''

 

Phuket Police Colonel Boonlert On-Kang, who is heading the investigation, said today that teams of police all over Phuket were hunting for the Honda Wave motorcycle identified as the getaway vehicle.

 

Phuket tourism authorities fear a turn-off by visitors, especially from Australia, unless the killers are apprehended quickly.

 

The Tourism Authority of Thailand is in ''deep shock and regret'' following the death of an Australian travel agent in Phuket, a spokesman said today.

 

Public relations manager Pongsak Kanittanon told e-Travel Blackboard that the tourist bureau considers agents its ''closest friends'' and will ''try their best'' to locate and arrest the two attackers.

 

''This incident affected a group of travel agents who we consider our closest friends, who help us to promote the destinations in Thailand,'' Mr Kanittanon said.

 

''As a National Tourist Office, we will closely monitor this situation and raise this incident with the higher authority in Bangkok to make sure that something like this will not happen again.''

 

Mr Kanittanon went on to send his deepest condolences to the family of the victim and prayed for the speedy recovery of the second agent injured during the incident.

 

''We sincerely hope that the local authorities will try their best to arrest these two attackers and try to bring back the confidence and safety to Phuket.''

 

The passing of the Australian travel agent has sent shockwaves through the entire island of Phuket and our travel industry, the TAT said.

 

UPDATE

 

 

All of the travel agents from Perth who were part of the group with murdered tourist Michelle Smith were heading home on a 2.55pm flight from Phuket via Singapore. Six top police from Phuket were present at the media conference at the Katathani Phuket Beach Resort, where the travel agents, on a familiarisation trip to Phuket, were staying. The agents were not part of the media conference.

 

 

 

My link

[Flashermac]

Phuket Tourist from Britain 'Stabbed on First Night'

 

 

PHUKET: A British tourist has told of being stabbed in an incident on Phuket early today - the same night that an Australian woman died in a second stabbing.

 

The man, who gave his name as Mohamad Zubair Edwa, 37, but is also believed to use the name Edward Wright, was grimacing in pain today in Phuket International Hospital as he told how three men on a motorbike confronted him, and one stabbed him in the side.

 

Mr Edwa, orginally from Cambridge, said he was riding from a bar near Chalong Circle to his Rawai apartment in southern Phuket about 3.30am after arriving on the island yesterday.

 

''Three men on a moped, they pulled up alongside me as i was riding and said 'Do you want a smoke,' obviously talking about drugs. I accelerated, driving faster.

 

''Somehow they overtook me and they blocked the road in front of me. Two stayed on the motorbike, one got off. I saw him on the road and went to go past him.

''Probably about 300 metres from the roundabout, he hit me with something metallic.

 

''As I was riding, I touched my back, and there was blood all over my hand. A lady saw me, she called an ambulance. She said 'I think you should go to hospital.'

 

''The ambulance arrived and took me to hospital.'' Doctors treated a knife wound in his side.

 

Mr Edwa lives in Kuala Lumpur, works as a wine broker dealing with fine wines, and has been holidaying in Bangkok and Chiang Mai for six weeks.

 

''I like Phuket it's very nice,'' he said. ''But not this.'' He hopes to be out of hospital later today.

 

There is no connection at this stage between the stabbing of Edwa and the killing of Michelle Smith outside the Katathani Beach Resort earlier in the night.

 

My link

[kamui]

Local Saitong Jankeaw, aged 40, sells popular pappaya salad close to the spot where Mrs Smith collapsed to the ground last night with a long knife slash to her heart.

 

''My husband Mr Preeya heard the screams. We were afraid to go out to help, it was so loud and frightening. I asked him whether we should go out but he said 'Maybe it's better not to go.''

 

 

 

Sad, isn't it. Even though I read frequently in regard to LOS not take too much interest if something bad is happening to sombody else.

[sayjann]

Sad, isn't it. Even though I read frequently in regard to LOS not take too much interest if something bad is happening to sombody else.

as i've always said i'm not an expert about Phuket.

but i notice most of the attacks are on women in quieter areas of Phuket.

Patong has it's detractors including me from time to time but you rarely hear of trouble in the main areas but no doubt it happens.

the locals will know about things the next day and i've really heard of serious trouble.

the areas around Bangla road are packed with tourists and yes you will get pickpockets and the scammers around but i've always felt safe in the area as there are many people around and i don't tend to walk around in places i don't know or with valuables.

many times i have been drunk and wandered back to the hotel unsteadily but i've never really attracted this sort of attention.

i remember a story of a young Australian woman who was robbed and raped by ladyboys earlier this year?.

hers was a tale of such stupidity but not that she deserved what happened to her.

but sometimes there is a little more to stories of this kind.

[gobbledonk]

Flash, why did you create a second thread for this 13 or so hours after I created the 'Australian woman stabbed in the heart in Phuket' thread in this same forum ??

[Flashermac]

Senility?

 

 

 

 

 

[Gadfly]

Phuket constantly gets bad press and, as far as I can tell, its deserved. This is not the first story we have seen about Farangs getting murdered or mugged by Thai thugs in Phuket. Nor will it be the last. Wait a month and I suspect we will have more grim news about a foreigner getting murdered, mugged or stomped in fracas with the Phuket mafia (and, in the latter case, weak claims by the local authorities and their sympathizers that the foreigners brought it on themselves.)

 

I simply don't visit anymore and tell my friends to avoid the place. There are alternatives if they want nightlife. If they want a nice beach, there are even better alternatives. There is just too much of this stuff going on for the international press to ignore.

[kamui]

Phuket constantly gets bad press and, as far as I can tell, its deserved. This is not the first story we have seen about Farangs getting murdered or mugged by Thai thugs in Phuket. Nor will it be the last. Wait a month and I suspect we will have more grim news about a foreigner getting murdered, mugged or stomped in fracas with the Phuket mafia (and, in the latter case, weak claims by the local authorities and their sympathizers that the foreigners brought it on themselves.)

 

I simply don't visit anymore and tell my friends to avoid the place. There are alternatives if they want nightlife. If they want a nice beach, there are even better alternatives. There is just too much of this stuff going on for the international press to ignore.

 

And different to Patty - where we regularly read that a drunk sex tourist, who lost the plot and who consorted with the wrong people, gets killed - in Phuket it happend to tourism professionals staying at a 5 star resort. And there is no way to come to the - even so frequently added - conclusion, that there is a backstory which implies that the victims indirectly caused their own death.

 

Anyway, even though Phuket seems to get bad press frequently - the jet ski scam, the taxi mafia attacking tourists - most tourists don't know about or don't care. The image of Thailand being the 'LOS' with nice people and pristine beaches is still prevalent in the West. Otherwise we wouldn't see the every increasing tourist numbers.

[sayjann]

Anyway, even though Phuket seems to get bad press frequently - the jet ski scam, the taxi mafia attacking tourists - most tourists don't know about or don't care.

 

i see these comments often about Phuket.

can someone explain what the jet-ski scam is?.

and stories of the 'taxi mafia' attacking tourists makes me mysterfied,again where,when,how often does this happen?.

what or who exactly are the 'taxi mafia'?

i don't use them or tuk-tuks so i'm unsure of what they do to piss people off.

after 12 Years of visiting i've never encountered any problems concerning these stories.