Dragons & Butterflies

by Shani Krebs

  ‘Chai wan nee pom long’ (Yes, this day I out), I replied.

  ‘Chok dee’ (Good luck), they would say, smiling back.

  I stayed outside till about 1pm, light-headed, excited and happy. Every day seemed to be bringing me closer to my freedom. In the meantime, though, I needed to find a place to stay and a locker to keep my things in.

  One of the Thai Mafia guys had become a good friend of mine. His name was Wichan and he had been born in Kanchanaburi, in western Thailand, the only son of a street fighter who had abandoned his family when Wichan was five years old. His mother inherited an 8ha farm, and she harvested rice, vegetables and fruit. During his school years, Wichan excelled at athletics and academically was rated among the top ten students. He also showed strong leadership qualities from a young age. But, as was the case with so many Thai teenagers, when he left school he took to the streets, and, as the years passed, he began his own protection racket. Before long, Wichan was feared and respected by all, and he very quickly advanced up the hierarchy of the local Mafia.

  By this time, he had been involved in many gunfights with his enemies, his rise to power beginning when he shot the leaders of his rival gangs (although none of them actually died). Word soon spread and, at age 19, Wichan was approached by an army general to be his personal bodyguard. Then one day he was given his first professional assignment, for which he would get approximately US$10 000. He was required to go to Phuket, where a contract had been taken out on a local businessman. He was given a photograph of the target and had to arrive a couple of days before, first to survey the area and then follow the businessman around. Apparently the businessman and five of his work colleagues were due to attend a meeting at a posh restaurant at a certain time. Without any disguise or anything, Wichan walked into the restaurant, went up to the table where the men were sitting talking, called out the guy’s name and, as the man turned around to see who was calling him, shot him at point-blank range with a .45 Colt. One bullet to the centre of his forehead. There was screaming and shouting, and people scattering in all directions, and amid the panic and chaos, Wichan made his escape. A close friend of his was outside waiting for him on a motorbike.

  That was Wichan’s first murder, and the first of many.

  Being spiritual, after he had murdered someone Wichan would buy a basket of food and take it to the temple, where he would offer the gift to the monks and pray for his victim’s family. In this way, he told me, he cleared his conscience. When I asked if he felt any pity for his victims, he said he felt nothing. He was only interested in the money. From the money he made for this first hit, Wichan gave a small portion to his friends and some went to his mother. In fact Wichan continued to support his mother for a long time without her knowing what he actually did for a living.

  Over the next two years, Wichan assassinated more than 20 people. A single bullet to the temple became his trademark. All of these hits were ordered by the army general he worked for, who was a big Mafia guy himself. When he was 20 years old, Wichan had his entire body tattooed, from his toes all the way to his head, except for his face. It took months. Sometimes there were two tattoo artists working on his body at the same time. At age 21, all Thai men are called up to do two years of military training, and, after he had completed his basic training, Wichan became a sniper. During the next two years he continued to kill whenever he was commissioned.

  Among his victims was a prominent politician in Bangkok, for which he got US$20 000. The fact that he was in the army helped him escape detection. After the army, he moved around from province to province, staying with close associates in different places. He became an independent agent, working for the highest bidder. By this time, Wichan had a reputation that stretched throughout the kingdom. Although he was much younger than other Mafia bosses, he was respected as their equal. With the killing of the politician, however, because it had been executed in Wichan’s trademark style, he became the number-one suspect, even though there had been no witnesses and no evidence had been found to link him to the killing. Nevertheless he was now listed as one of Thailand’s ten Most Wanted.

  When he was 25, Wichan was commissioned to kill a deputy mayor in a city about 600km west of Bangkok. After assassinating his victim, as he was making his escape, he noticed a young boy watching him from about 30m away. There was no doubt that the boy had witnessed the murder, but Wichan thought that at that distance he would not have been able to identify him, so he left. At that time, Wichan was staying in a rented apartment on the 20th floor of a high-rise building. Two months later, at around 9.30am, while he was still fast asleep, 15 members of one of Thailand’s elite police units kicked down his door, rushed in and apprehended him. The young witness had clearly had better vision than Wichan had thought.

  Wichan had two handguns in his possession, an 11mm Colt and a 9mm Beretta. He immediately called the army general, who instructed him not to talk and told him to just take it easy. The police held and interrogated him for 15 days, at the end of which he still pleaded innocent. He was given bail. In the meantime, the young boy who, it turned out, had witnessed the assassination but was the only witness, was intimidated and threated with death. Wichan’s lawyers also paid off the public prosecutor, which is common practice in Thailand to win a case. All charges were dropped and Wichan was released.

  A couple of years later, Wichan met the girl of his dreams. She was the book-keeper at a reputable company. His mother asked her family if they could be married, and, at an elaborate ceremony, which was attended by the general and a variety of friends and acquaintances from the army, the police and the Mafia, Wichan and his bride tied the knot. This was a pivotal moment in his life, and he told me he couldn’t ever remember a time when he was as happy as he was that day. There and then he decided to stop killing. After a year, his wife bore him a beautiful son.

  Things weren’t going so well for his mother, however, who had run into financial difficulty. She needed to sell their house, although Wichan was against this because it had been their family home for many years. He made a commitment to his mother that he would alleviate her financial problems. He called the army general, saying he needed work; if anything came up, the general should let Wichan know. The general contacted a friend of his, another general, who was in the police, and who was under investigation for illegal casino activities. The army general enquired whether he knew anyone who might want someone assassinated. The police general was only too happy to oblige, and he ordered the murder of the government official who was spearheading the investigation against him.

  Wichan’s fee was 2 million Thai baht (US$70 000). The hit was to take place about 400km outside Bangkok, in the province of Isan. The police general had organised an apartment where Wichan, along with his getaway motorbike friend, would wait for the call. The call came around lunchtime, and Wichan made his way to the government official’s residence, where he found him relaxing in a deckchair beside the pool. The first bullet caught him in the centre of his forehead, and this was followed by four shots into his body. After hearing the shots, two bodyguards came running out, but by this time Wichan and his friend had already made their escape.

  ‘Yibloy’ (Done already), Wichan said when he phoned the police general, and the money was duly wired to his account.

  In fact, I remembered this particular incident well, because it took place when I was already in prison. It was very big news.

  For about a month nothing happened, and Wichan expected to get away with this crime, as he’d gotten away with all the other murders he’d committed. Then, out of the blue, the police general calmly informed him that he was now the prime suspect in the case, as the bullets he had used in many of his other killings matched those found at the latest crime scene. Before he could react, members of the Special Forces surrounded his mother’s house, but they didn’t find Wichan there. By then he was hiding with one of his associates in an apartment in Sukhumvit Soi 4 in Bangkok’s red-light district. Then, at the suggestion of the gener
al, he and his friend left Bangkok and hid out at Ko Samui, where he blended in with the holiday-makers. They’d been there about a week when he received another call from the general, who told him that the police knew where he was. Wichan drove on his own to a cabin in the mountains about 120km away, where he hoped nobody would find him. His luck, however, was about to run out. Two days later, early in the morning, the police descended on the cabin. Wichan tried to run but was quickly apprehended. Apparently his friend had been caught, and, after being badly tortured and beaten up, he had given away Wichan’s hiding place.

  Wichan confessed to the murder, but once he appeared in court he retracted his confession. He was then flown to Bangkok in a private plane. For the next week the story was in the headlines every day in every major newspaper in Thailand. Wichan was charged for the two murders and taken to a special high-security prison. Three days later, the police general was also arrested. He, too, pleaded innocent but still managed to get bail. Wichan pleaded guilty to the murder of the government official but not to the killing of the deputy mayor. Basically, what happened was that he entered into a plea bargain with the prosecutor because the killing of the government official was so high-profile that the police really just wanted to close the case.

  While out on bail, and after many court appearances, he was sentenced to life imprisonment on 12 November 2008 and transferred to Klong Prem, Building 2, where his reputation had preceded him. Everybody knew Wichan. He was infamous among all the inmates, who both feared and respected him. In prison he ran a protection racket and was boss of the casino in Building 2, where, on a good day, there would be up to 7 million Thai baht on the table. At the end of the day, after paying the guards, he would pocket about 100 000 Thai baht, some of which he shared with his boys, and some of which he sent to his associates on the outside, most of whom in fact had no idea he was even in prison.

  After Wichan had made a small fortune, one of the prisoners videoed the casino operation inside the prison and sent it to the Department of Corrections, who launched a full-scale search of Building 2. They found over 200 mobiles and a whole load of money, literally millions, which they confiscated. They also found a bag full of phones in the Building Chief’s office; the chief was keeping the phones safe for their owners – at a price, of course.

  In the time Wichan had been in Klong Prem, he had never had a single visitor. His mother did not know where he was, although sometimes he used to call her, and even send her money. In the prison he controlled his boys with an iron fist, and if one of them stepped out of line or used drugs, which he was totally against, he would beat them up, often using a baton. The authorities always turned a blind eye. In the general amnesty of 2010 his sentence was reduced to 40 years, and in 2011 he was given a one-third reduction. Now he had 28 years to go.

  About three years back, during a big clampdown in Klong Prem, all the Big Legs were transferred to other prisons. With his main source of income cut off, Wichan decided to turn over a new leaf. He started praying and generally tried to behave like a gentleman. He claimed he regretted having killed all those people. His wife was still waiting for him, and his kid, who was seven years old by the time I got to know Wichan, was apparently very artistic. There was a good chance he would become eligible for parole in August 2014; if he did get out, his plan was to become a farmer and breed fighting chickens.

  I met Wichan when I was transferred from Khao Bin prison to Klong Prem and thrown into solitary confinement. During the first few days that I was there, he and I had a serious problem, which almost resulted in a physical altercation. As I didn’t really know anybody in the prison, I backed down after he challenged me. Over the weeks that followed, however, we eventually exchanged a few words. One day, he asked me if I could box and challenged me to a friendly fight. After that, we started sparring with each other every afternoon and became friends.

  When I eventually came out of solitary, it was Wichan who gave me a place to stay and a locker for my stuff. During this time I personally witnessed his transformation and I truly believed he deserved a second chance. To me, he would always remain a brother.

  After solitary, I moved into the general population and my new room was cell number 95. Frankly, this cell, which had belonged to some of the guys who had been evacuated, was in a hell of a state; it was full of dust and spider’s webs. The key-boy for the section helped me remove all of the previous inmates’ personal belongings. I was told by Santi that I could stay on my own in the meantime, but as soon as the evacuees returned I would have to find two inmates to stay in there with me. I was hoping that by then we would have received the amnesty and, if it was a one-fifth reduction, I would be home by January.

  It took me about four hours to clean the cell and unpack my things. The euphoria of being out of solitary was kind of overwhelming. At first I couldn’t sleep and dozed off around midnight, only to wake up at 3am, tossing and turning. Then, as I was dozing off again, I was woken by a huge cockroach crawling over my face. I nearly had a heart attack. First on my list of things to do, I decided then and there, was to seal the netting, which had gaps all around it where insects could come and go freely in and out of the cell.

  I found a spot that looked like a good place to hang out, in an area that had previously been assigned to death row inmates. There was generally quite a lot of space. The section was like a reasonably large dining hall with long concrete tables and benches placed at right angles to each other. Some guys kept all their belongings in cardboard boxes under or along a table. There were packs of bottled water stacked all around the place, and at the entrance there was a hot water machine. Further along the rear was an area where the guys showered, and just to the left of that was a shack where the toilets were – surprisingly, these were all Western-type toilets with seats. After all my years in prison, this really posed a problem for me. I had become so accustomed to squatting that, when using the seat, I had to stand on it to find my balance. One time I slipped off in the middle of having a crap!

  Beside this area, closer to where the tables were, was a row of tiled concrete basins where you could wash your dishes. There were also a couple of taps, which was far more civilised than what you had at Bangkwang.

  On my first full day outside of solitary, I noticed that there were a couple of guys around the building who played backgammon, and I looked forward to finding someone I could play with. Jesus, it was quite strange, being in the sunlight again. One guy gave me a deckchair and I sat in it for a long time, just revelling in the unusual sensation of the sun’s rays on my skin.

  Every morning I would go for a jog, and then I would work out at the gym, which consisted of a couple of benches and one or two shoulder and chest machines. Then I would take a shower, collect my dirty laundry and give it to my new wash boy – a welcome change from having to do all my own laundry every day. In fact, the skin on my hands was raw and peeling from the harsh chemicals in the washing powder. In solitary, your food was delivered to your cell. Now I had to get used to lining up for it. Some days I would really get pissed off because some of the Thais would just come and push their way to the front. I didn’t say anything, though. I wanted to avoid any sort of confrontation.

  I had taken to washing my food with hot water. Every day I ordered a salad, two corns on the cob, and some vegetable stirfry (which wasn’t too bad, but also had to be rinsed), but the bulk of my meal would be fruit. I would get a punnet of papino, grapes, pineapple and sometimes a mango. Most of the food was cold by the time we got it, so some of the guys would steam it up. After we had eaten, I would relax in my deckchair and even doze off for 30 minutes or so. There was really not much to do, and keeping my mind occupied was rather difficult, but, as the days went by, I got into something of a routine, and I would catch a game of backgammon here and there.

  Between 2.30 and 3pm they would announce on the loudspeaker which floor, upstairs or downstairs, would have to enter their cells first. As we passed through the passage, the guards would do the us
ual checking – they’d frisk us and search through our things. Once we were locked in the cell I would take a short nap and then get up and shower. Then I would put on a clean pair of boxers and T-shirt and daven the afternoon prayer that is said before sunset. Afterwards I would eat my fruit, and then it was teeth-cleaning time, which was still something of an obsession for me. Sometimes I’d watch a little TV or read a book or write a letter, and then around 9.30 I would daven Ma’ariv (the evening prayer).

  I would lie quietly on my bed thinking about my freedom and my hopefully imminent release, and I’d wonder when the other prisoners were going to return. I kept trying to imagine what life would be like on the outside, what my friends looked like, whether they were even alive. Some of them I hadn’t heard from during my entire incarceration. What was the new South Africa like, and how would I fit into it? From what I’d heard it was crime-ridden, but what exactly did that tell me – was it safe to walk in the streets?

  On 30 November 2011 I experienced quite a fast vibration in my heart. This lasted approximately a minute, but it kept recurring, so I decided to report sick. At the hospital they did an ECG, which was performed by a prisoner who worked there. Once I had the results I had to wait to see a doctor. I explained that I had been diagnosed with a heart condition, atrial fibrillation, back in 2008, and I told the doctor that if he could prescribe some blood-thinning aspirin, that was what was needed for my heart to beat regularly again. The doctor examined my ECG scan and confidently pronounced my heart rate as too slow. I asked him what his area of expertise was and he told me he was an ear specialist! I just laughed and told him I needed to see another doctor. One thing I was sure of was that my heart wasn’t beating slowly; it was beating too fast. I waited for another three hours before I was finally seen by another doctor, who said that all I had experienced was heart palpitations and that in fact the ECG scan showed my heart to be normal. But he gave me aspirin and prescribed propranolol as well, which I should take only if the palpitations recurred.