Police have arrested the woman at the centre of a sex scandal involving numerous senior monks.
Wilawan “Golf” Emsawat, 35, was arrested at her house in Nonthaburi after police found evidence of a 380,000-baht sum transferred to her by a senior monk from a bank account of his temple.
The money was transferred on Feb 16, 2024 by the monk, who on Monday left the monkhood and admitted to having given money to the woman.
Ms Wilawan was aware that the money belonged to the temple but she still ordered the monk to make the transfer, police said.
The 67-year-old monk was the abbot of Wat Chujit Dhammaram in Ayutthaya province. He said he also transferred 12.8 million baht from his personal bank account to the woman.
However, he denied that they ever were intimate.
Ms Wilawan spent 385 million baht transferred to her bank accounts over the past three years, according to police.
Most of the money was lost to gambling websites.
The sex scandal came to light late last month when an abbot in Bangkok disappeared and later left the monkhood. Police suspected the disappearance resulted from a woman’s attempt to blackmail him.
Police said the woman’s relationship with the former abbot began in May last year. Later the relationship cooled and the woman claimed she had a child with the former abbot. She demanded 30,000 baht a month in support payments for 20 years.
The abbot tried to end the relationship because he could not afford the payments, police said.
After police linked Ms Wilawan to the case, they searched her house on July 4.
Among her belongings were five phones containing 80,000 pictures and videos of her with senior monks from many famous Buddhist temples. The case quickly became known as the “Sika Golf” affair — “Sika” means female devotee associated with a monk.
Police said Ms Wilawan told investigators that she had sex with nine monks, eight of whom have since left the monkhood. Their money transfers to her were from four to eight digits.
