Flying dead toad used to smuggle SIM cards into Bangkok prison
The Bangkok Post runs another classic on its front page today: “A number of mobile phones and SIM cards were seized during a surprise search at Bang Kwang prison in Nonthaburi province yesterday. The search was part of the prison’s attempts to prevent inmates from running illicit drug operations from behind prison walls.
Prison commander Sopon Thititam-pruek said there were frequent attempts to smuggle mobile phones and SIM cards into the prison compound, because Bang Kwang housed a large number of drug dealers. [Ed note: Bang Kwang is the notorious “Bangkok Hilton”, the subject of prison memoirs The Damage Done and Forget You Had A Daughter and the Australian TV mini-series Bangkok Hilton, starring Nicole Kidman and Hugo Weaving].
Many of them continued to run their drug rings from inside the prison, he said.
Bribery was believed to be rife as many drug convicts serving long sentences had developed close ties with prison guards over the years.
Threats were even made against some prison guards and their families if they refused to cooperate with those convicts or to turn a blind eye to their illegal activities, he said.
Inmates had come up with novel ways to smuggle mobile phones and SIM cards into their prison cells.
”We have found a mobile phone hidden in food, in pork leg stew. SIM cards were found inside a dried squid. One was found stuffed inside a dead toad which was thrown over the prison wall,” he said.
The prison was jolted on Sept 19 when two SIM cards were found inside a dried squid during a check on a package delivered to Somsak Yala, a drug convict on death row.
A search of a package sent to convict Pairote Niamlang found a SIM card hidden inside a lotion bottle.
Since early this year 24 smuggled mobile phones had been found in the jail, wrapped in rubber sheets and hidden in toilet tanks. Report: PONGKAN CHONGCHAIHARN.”
It’s also worth noting that you can visit prisoners at Bang Kwang if you want to give some support to Westerners serving sentences there. See Bangkwang.net for more details.
More on Bang Kwang:
Spike | Google | Amazon UK | Amazon US | Wikipedia | Open Directory
Other Splinters posts of interest:
- Throw The Book At ‘Em
- Convoy of Death
- In the penal colony
- Archer’s Inferno
- The Final Sentence Readers of Beckett�s Trilogy…
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Limmunize » What’s New Pussycat
February 10th, 2008
[…] what’s the best way to smuggle SIM cards from your phones? Through Dead Toads of […]