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French tourist Muriel Freseau, 64, allegedly shoplifted suncream today

French Tourist Heads for Phuket Beach But Spends Day in Cell After Suncream Heist

Sunday, March 15, 2015
PHUKET: A Frenchwoman who allegedly shoplifted a bottle of suncream from a Phuket convenience store was challenged by the store staff as she applied the protection at a nearby beach today.

In an unusual twist to another day in paradise, Muriel Freseau, 64, began this morning by going to the Family Mart near the coast road north of Patong, where security cameras apparently captured her stealing the suncream.

The stolen protection was being applied when a staffer from the shop caught up with her. But it will not be needed for a little while.

She is likely to stay in a cell at Kathu Police Station, which oversees Patong, until she appears in court on a theft charge shortly.

Comments

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Another black eye for the Frenchies, as another "quality" tourist tries to save a few hundred baht. What a dope.

Posted by Ed Sanders on March 15, 2015 17:06

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Kleptomania is not a good sickness wherever you are in the world, is it? If you know you are suffering from it check out the local law for you own convenience.

Posted by Joe on March 15, 2015 17:43

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Usually prisoners ask police for protection but she has to give it. Huh?

Posted by Anonymous on March 15, 2015 17:54

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Ed Sanders,

it is a new phenomena of a mentality of modern shoplifter and how far it is spread:

just recently came across statistics on shoplifting by National Association of Shoplifting Prevention (UK).
http://goo.gl/DGYw2u

Most interesting points:
Facts:

- There are approximately 27 million shoplifters (or 1 in 11 people) in our nation today. More than 10 million people have been caught shoplifting in the last five years.

- The vast majority of shoplifters are ???non-professionals????? who steal, not out of criminal intent, financial need or greed but as a response to social and personal pressures in their life

- The excitement generated from ???getting away with it????? produces a chemical reaction resulting in what shoplifters describe as an incredible ???rush????? or ???high????? feeling. Many shoplifters will tell you that this high is their ???true reward,????? rather than the merchandise itself.

- Most non-professional shoplifters don???t commit other types of crimes. They???ll never steal an ashtray from your house and will return to you a $20 bill you may have dropped. Their criminal activity is restricted to shoplifting and therefore, any rehabilitation program should be ???offense-specific????? for this crime.



From legal point of view I am concerned about why she has to be put into preliminary detention? Are there any grounds to believe she would hamper investigation etc.? of course, it is applied as a kind of punishment.

In Europe it is already almost eradicated putting suspects who do not create risk of intervening with investigation, in preliminary custody - after numerous ECHT decision, that concluded that such measures are warranted only on analysis of peculiar circumstances of every case.



Penal Code provide up to 3 years in prison or up to 6kTHB fine for a theft, regardless of value of stolen things:

Section 334 Whoever, dishonestly taking away the thing of other person or which the other person to beco-owner to be said to commit the theft, shall be imprisoned not out of three years andfined not out of six thousand Baht.



... I recall recent spectacular Ferrari speed crash in Bangkok on a highway , and offender paid 2just ,000 fine, and that's all, no any actions..

I do not , of course, support her in her offence - in the end those 5-10% are paid by all consumers - just wondering that such quite a petty thing, is resolved in a clearly disproportionate manner, at the time when there is a pile up to clouds of other larger issues, which by far do not get such amount of attention.

Posted by Sue on March 15, 2015 18:38

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What did you expect if tourist are not allowed to use beach umbrellas on your beaches?

Posted by abr?? on March 15, 2015 19:19

Editor Comment:

Beach umbrellas can be hired.

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Sue is there anyway you can express yourself in less than 1000 words please. We have to consider the poorer countries of the world that do not have fast internet access!!!!! Be cool.

Posted by Sue Watcher on March 15, 2015 20:27

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Sue, I have to ask, Did the Ferrari slide on stolen sunscreen lotion?
If you reduce the size of your posts, I promise to take you shopping.

Posted by Manowar on March 15, 2015 20:27

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Sue Watcher,

I think there is kind of mistake, I never post here so much as 1000 words per post. The last post here is just 422 ones, among them 152 words of indirect speech and only 270 words is a direct speech.

I am intrigued what is the country with slow broadband, as in the region Thailand has the slowest one, bar Myanmar.
Browsers with turbo servers like Opera desktop, or OperaMini/Chrome mobile, are of the help.
Occasionally , when my 4G limit is used, and speed reduced to 384kbps , just browsing without turbo at that speed is absolutely, but on some SIM cards it is reduced even to 64kbps - and in turbo regime it is still with some delays but enjoyable, with all pictures etc., incl. PW site.

Posted by Sue on March 15, 2015 21:17

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@ SUE.. Can u post a pic of u? please i want to se if u are human...

Posted by frog on March 16, 2015 00:52

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Manowar,

if you would ever driven a modern high-powered car, then you would know that it is much easier manageable than "just a car", it's designed in a way that by the mean of construction or mechanical or electronic systems it is much less vulnerable to inclement external conditions or mistakes of driver.
Contrary to a common belief, in order to crash such car one should exercise much higher degree of negligence than for "just a car".
However a dangerousness to environment and destruction brought by a bolid almost flying at speeds close to 300kph, surely is much larger than by "just a car".
And surely, social cost is higher than of shoplifter of a tube of sunscreen.

I'm curios whether she will be awarded a fine more than in Ferrari case 2000THB.
Will be she put in a jail for a month, and also fined for 5,000THB, at the same time visa cancelled, consequently deported, that would generate also an extra cost of a new ticket..?

If UK statistics shows that every 11th Brit is a shoplifter, then France and Australia probably would exhibit similar ones? Would that mean deport at once 9% of all incoming guests as a preventive measure against shoplifting ?

Posted by Sue on March 16, 2015 04:18

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Sad if true that this lady has enough money presumably to come from France to Thailand on holiday and then steals a few hundred Baht of sun cream. Although I never agree in theft if someone is desperate for money for food etc it is more understanding than this case. At her age she should know better any way.

Posted by Where Do I Pay on March 16, 2015 15:32

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cameras working well here but not out the front of TaiPan !

Posted by Harry on March 16, 2015 15:52

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Sue,
Whether a super car or your average vehicle with today's technology neither is more manageable.
Technology in high powered vehicles is required to achieve performance design of the vehicle. Traction control, ABS, variable engine mapping, self adjusting spoilers and active suspension allow power transfer at optimum levels. As these change with speed, cornering and under braking, the technology doesn't make the car more drivable but does allow the driver assistance to use the performance available.
If you had ever driven such a vehicle you would know that any vehicle having high power to weight ratio is very reactive to the slightest input, more difficult to drive but at the same in a suitable environment, can be a lot of fun.

Posted by Manowar on March 16, 2015 17:25

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Sue

Enough is enough! Go for a swim, maybe a daily jog or possibly a stimulating walk routine. You need to get away from the computer for a bit. Life has a lot more to offer than continual endless comments with no meaning.

Posted by Anonymous on March 16, 2015 18:52

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The Cancer Council will be proud of this "Slip, Slop, Slapper"

Posted by Manowar on March 17, 2015 02:14

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Sue, I agree with the essence of your first post. The majority of habitual shoplifters are not criminals but are suffering from a type of addiction or mental condition and should be treated accordingly. You just take so dam long to make your point and whats with all of the question marks????????

Posted by pete59 on March 17, 2015 09:09

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pete59

questions marks are machine-generated convertion of symbols which can not be displayed at PhuketWan site due the website using a coding table that doesn't include these symbols.

????? appears as you can see, within a fragment of text I copied from NASP page, that was a kind of (inverted) quotes - and there are many UNICODE symbols appears rather similar but with different underlying codes, that's why it amy happens that these symbols aren't displayed properly.

I guess PW has at the moment other higher priority goals and tasks than upgarde web-site coding tables..

Posted by Sue on March 19, 2015 02:37

Editor Comment:

People who copy and paste do so at their own risk, Sue.


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