Graphic design by akarawut
In this chapter, we present an absurdist sort of Seven Wonders from our three-year record of reimbursements for costs of travel to the accused, defendants, and detainee families in freedom-related cases in Thailand. As caretakers of the Will of the People Fund, we’ve been plunged into a world of clerical detail regarding documentation of travel costs and evidence of dates scheduled for a given case. On the wayside of the criminal justice process lie the microscopic fragments of such a world, which we are piecing together into picture stories here so that the reader/donor can actually imagine the rugged extremes of hardship in such a flat term as “costs of travel.” The seven travel superlatives are: the Longest Trip; the Most Legs in One Trip; the Farthest Trip; the Most Wasted Trip; the Almost Wasted Trip; the Most Trips in One Case; and finally, the Most Final Trip.
• The Longest Trip
Due to unlawlike legal peculiarities of the lese majeste law in Thailand where everyone is given free rein in filing a police report without ever having to shoulder the burden of proof, one can simply lounge around in front of the computer or mobile phone screen at home, look for a stationary target online, take a (screen)shot or two, and hand the victim off to the nearest police station. Among the ranks of “frequent filers,” the farther away from the nation’s center their residence is, the more schadenfreude they seem to derive from filing a report. And so arose a rash of lese majeste cases in the deep southern province of Narathiwat simply because one filer had an address there. The burden, then, fell on the accused whose legal fight began with figuring out how to get to where they were summoned to.
• The Most Legs in One Trip
Another hotspot for “remote” lese majeste and computer crime cases is the Samut Prakan Provincial Court, due to filings by an active citizen who had an address in Bang Kaew, Samut Prakan. At first glance this court may seem centrally located enough, it being part of the Bangkok Metropolitan Area and within walking distance from the skytrain, but sometimes people don’t live in Bangkok. This defendant from Koh Chang, for example, had to travel six legs each way by six different forms of transport.
• The Farthest Trip
Beyond land and water, air transport is another option for travel during the criminal justice process, be it domestic or international. This case is a mass prosecution of 20 anti-government protestors for unlawful assembly and violation of the Emergency Act during COVID, which ended in acquittal for all charges, but the people (meaning the defendants and the donors, not the prosecutor who might elsewhere speak in the name of the People) had already paid the price—including that of a plane ticket from Singapore—throughout the two-year legal struggle.
• The Most Wasted Trip
We have reimbursed many trips that were wasted, from trips to a court date that ended up being rescheduled due to someone’s absence, to this trip to prison to bring a family member home—only to be told they’d been told the wrong date. A wasted trip still counts as a trip, because it actually took place; however meaningless the trip was, it still incurred a cost.
• The Almost Wasted Trip
But on occasion, a trip was saved from being wasted. This almost wasted trip was for a monthly appearance at court that was scheduled on a Saturday instead of a weekday. This also happens to be the same defendant as the one in the Most Legs in One Trip example. (He also had to request up to three days off work for each trip). The defendant’s case bailor who monitored the situation from home and another bailor authorized to act on her behalf at the scene had to join forces in arguing with the court official so that the time and money already spent by the defendant (and the bailor, too) did not come to naught for no good reason.
• The Most Trips in One Case
In quite a few cases for which we reimbursed costs of travel, their history dated back all the way to the try-civilians-in-military-courts era after the 2014 coup. This case, for example, began in the jurisdiction of the Bangkok Military Court before going back to square one in a civilian court. By the time the case concluded at the Court of Appeal, a whopping 73 dates had taken place: from an additional charge notification date, indictment dates, arraignment dates, conference dates, hearing dates, check-in dates, to sentencing dates.
• The Most Final Trip
By “final,” we do not mean the final judgment from a high court or the final stop in the justice process for a convict. We are referring to that which, once and for all, puts an end to a defendant’s journey before their case concludes. In these cases, some became fugitives or asylees, while others, even more finally, passed away before their trial was over.
- The Khon Kaen Model Case: with its nine-year duration dating from the coup in 2014, out of the 26 defendants, two became fugitives/asylees and three died before the day of judgment
- The Thalufah Village Case: out of the 61 defendants, eight became fugitives/asylees and two died before the day of judgment
- The WeVo Guards Case: out of the 45 defendants, one died before the day of judgment
- The Royal Motorcade Polling Case: out of the eight defendants, one died before the day of being granted bail
Previously: