The military court sentenced an anti-establishment red shirt accused of publishing a fake royal statement to five years imprisonment with the jail term suspended.
The Military Court of Bangkok on Monday, 19 October 2015, sentenced Krit B., a red shirt man accused of offences under Article 112 of the Criminal Crime Code, lese majeste law, and Article 14 of the Computer Crime Code for importing illegal computer contents to five years imprisonment.
The defendant was indicted for publishing a forged statement of the Bureau of the Royal Household, which stated that King Bhumibol had decided to appoint a Regent to act on his behalf.
The sentence was read right after Krit recanted his innocent plea and pleaded guilty. Since he pleaded guilty, the military court halved the jail term to two years and six months, including, suspended the jail term for three years.
The military court’s verdict is similar to the sentence given to Niran Yaowapa, a former editor of ASTV Manager Online, a yellow-shirt news outlet, who was also charged with lese majeste law for publishing the same document.
The former editor who was demoted after he was charged with Article 112 was given five years jail term. However, the jail term was halved and suspended for three years.
The Military Court on 10 February 2015 approved custody warrants for Niran and Krit B., another lese majeste suspect accused in the same case, who is an active member of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), the main faction of the anti-establishment red shirts.
While the military court then granted 2.9 million baht bail to Niran on the same day that the custody warrant for him was issued, citing that there was no flight risk, Krit was held in custody for two weeks.
Krit and his defence lawyer, Winyat Chatmontree from Free Thai Legal Aid, submitted a 400,000 baht bail request, but the court denied bail, citing flight risk and the severity of the case.
The Court’s decision to grant bail to the yellow-shirt suspect, but not to the red-shirt suspect charged with the same offences was highly criticised as biased, and the Military Court later granted 400,000 baht bail to Krit on 17 February 2015.
The red shirt was arrested by more than ten military and police officers at his house in central Phetchabun Province on 3 February 2015. The officers interrogated him at a nearby police station for around three hours before searching the houses of two of his friends. Krit was then detained at a military camp for seven days before being detained at the Bangkok Central Remand Prison for another seven days.
The lese majeste case against Krit B. is still ongoing and the next hearing in the case will be held on 19 October 2015.
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