(Standing) Italian engineers Antonio Di Muro and Danilo Der Vito look on as Thai police officers investigate arrested kidnapping suspected Uzbekistan national Muhiddin Sharipov (seated second left) at Lumpini police station in Bangkok on Friday night.
Two Thai policemen have been arrested and authorities were hunting for two others yesterday for allegedly kidnapping and extorting money from Italian tourists. The officers were arrested in Bangkok on Friday after Interpol lodged a complaint against them, the Bangkok Post newspaper reported yesterday.
Danillo de Vito, 51, and Antonio Di Muno, 62, were allegedly detained by four policemen last Monday, hours after they arrived in the kingdom on holiday, while withdrawing cash from an ATM, Metropolitan Police commander Suebsak Pansuri said. They were accused of using a fake ATM card, and told to pay 2mn baht ($64,515) for police to drop charges.
The Italians managed to reduce the amount by half and alerted their relatives in Italy to the scam when calling them to ask for the money. Their relatives alerted Italian police who passed on the complaint to Interpol. Police found the two Italians in a Bangkok motel on Tuesday, after they had already transferred the money to Thailand. The two men were unharmed.
Police have also arrested an Uzbekistani national, Muhiddin Sharipov, who acted as interpreter for the police officers, The Nation newspaper reported yesterday.
