SAMUT PRAKAN: Nine Thais who say they were lured to Cambodia with a promise of well-paid jobs and then found themselves working at a call centre have been returned to Thailand after the place was raided by police.
The six men and three women arrived at Suvarnabhumi airport from Phnom Penh on Thai Airways International flight TG585 late on Thursday night, and were questioned by tourist police.
Pol Maj Gen Surachet Hakpan, acting deputy chief of the Tourist Police Bureau, told a media briefing on Friday the nine said they went to Cambodia in November after being offered what they thought were good jobs.
A broker had promised them work as phone operators in Cambodia with a promise of a 20,000 baht monthly salary.
Instead, when they arrived they were taken for training in what they realised was a call centre scam. They were taught the spiel to persuade people over the phone to send them money.
Realising they had been duped, they sought help via Facebook from the Thai embassy. The embassy alerted Cambodian police, who raided the gang on Thursday, Pol Maj Gen Surachet. said
The nine were identified as Noppadol Ruangdet, 23, Sitthichart Tatep, 47, Khao Puansuk, 46, Ms Malai Kaewsutin, 23, Ms Alongkorn Tatep, 21, Amornsak Yangtiang, 30, and Siprai Jordam, 47, all of Tak; Ms Thidarat Jordam, 37 of Sing Buri, and Wutthisak Pumkesa, 29, of Uttaradit.
Pol Maj Gen Surachet said the gang in Cambodia were part of the network of illegal call centres run by Tommy Wu, an Indonesian arrested earlier in Bangkok’s Ram Intra area.
Pol Maj Gen Surachet said the workers would be treated as witnesses.
