The Last Executioner

by Chavoret Jaruboon

I had never really taken much notice of the prison when I was growing up. It was a landmark like any other, and I gave it as much attention as I gave the opium houses, or maybe less so. Now that I was about to enter it for the very first time I noted everything in the minutest detail. The walls were huge and seemed to go on forever—in fact they are 2,406 metres long and six metres high.

  We made our way to the general office where we were welcomed by the Slab Visutthimuk, the superintendent. He was quite pleasant and asked us a few questions about our education, work experience and skills. There were vacancies in all the different sectors within the prison, such as administration, prisoners’ welfare, teaching and religious instruction, and prison warden. After spending some time with us he decided who was best suited for what. Basically the girls ended up in the pen-pushing departments while the guys and I headed to the custody section to meet another boss, Manoo Nargvichian. My first responsibilities were to search the prisoners for weapons and drugs when they went in and out of the different buildings, and make sure they were wearing their uniforms correctly, and I had to train the ‘assistants’, the fierce inmates chosen to help the prison officers in keeping a firm control of the jail. Their official name was ‘trustee’.

  ***

  It is the smell of pig shit that hits you first. Livestock were kept to the left of the prison’s entrance, in what was known as the vocational training area. However, that smell was no where as bad as the smell inside the prison. I thought I was going to be sick that first day. I do remember being seriously worried that I wouldn’t be able to stick it out. It’s hard to say which was worse—the stench of urine, shit, stale sweat, or rotting foodstuff.

  I wasn’t allowed to patrol the wings of the prison until I had spent a month getting to know the place. Patrolling could be a risky business; a guard had been killed after finding a prisoner attempting to escape. For the first few weeks I only patrolled in the company of a senior officer. We were told never to turn our backs on a prisoner because it would give him the chance to hit you, and we were also told never to stop a fight in case we got hurt. There was an evening and night shift—basically the jail had to be patrolled from 4.30 in the morning to 6am the following morning. This would be divided into three sections: 4.30am – 12pm, 12pm – 3am and 3am to 6am. We would take turns covering the different stages. It was quite strict when I started. You had to walk quietly and not let your keys jangle together. Any guard who fell asleep on his shift would be reported. I think it is different today, a bit more laid-back. The guards today can watch TV, which was unheard of when I first started patrolling.

  I was very apprehensive about meeting the prisoners themselves. I had always been careful to stay away from trouble and now I was going to be dealing with hardened criminals. Some of them were definitely rough looking but in fact they were quite well behaved. They knew the rules and most just wanted to keep their heads down and get on with it. It was a big enough job trying to get on with other prisoners without willfully pissing off the guards. There were the normal power struggles as in any society. Someone who committed a murder thought he was toughest until the next one bragged that he had killed 12, and so on. As I got used to the job and the prisoners I reasoned that it didn’t matter how notoriously bad they had been on the outside, now they all had to wear shorts and address me as sir.

  Their lives revolved around routine. The day began at 6am with breakfast. At 8.30am prisoners, who wished to, attended the various vocational training workshops or classes. Lunch was at mid-day, followed by more classes at 1pm until 3.30pm. Then there was an hour of recreation for personal activities. Some enjoyed sports or just worked out to keep fit. Dinner was at 4.30pm and at 5.30pm the prisoners were locked back into their cells for the evening. The prisoners were supposed to sleep from 9pm but they usually stayed up until midnight chatting. They had an easier time than prisoners did years ago. In the early days there were no humanitarian organisations keeping an eye on conditions. Nowadays, officers cannot hit inmates and there has also been quite a furore over the wearing of leg irons. The chains are smaller and lighter today and are only used on death row prisoners or on prisoners likely to try to escape. It is the Ministry of Interior who decides whether a prisoner should be chained up or not. Female convicts are not required to wear chains. The shackles were formerly used as an extra punishment for being in prison, now they are more about preventing escape.

  I wasn’t interested in befriending the prisoners. One of them did ask me where I was from and was delighted to hear me say Nonthaburi, as that was where he was from. I was very strict in those early days and had no real interest in the men as yet. Over time I would wonder what brought them to the jail. I attended seminars on criminality and read up on the cases of the prisoners to understand them better. Fortunately I didn’t have to patrol as much as the others. I spent a lot of time in my office liaising with the ‘helpers’ which I felt made me look authoritative and gave me a bit of leverage with the rest of the prisoners.

  Managing the ‘assistants’ was a good job and I was appreciative of it. I was given it on account of my army training and experience. These inmates were like the highest-ranking prisoners—they didn’t live with the rest of the prisoners, instead they had their own little dormitories which were located in front of Wings 5 and 6. They were my own army of 30 men who had to do my bidding. Of course it wasn’t going to be easy. I had to make my mark first, though only one guy gave me some attitude because I was a rookie. Some papers had fallen all over the floor and I asked him to pick them up. He refused and said it wasn’t his job. I said nothing and just smiled at him, and waited.

  On Saturday I summoned all the assistants to my office. I told them that I wanted them to check around the Bang Kwang wall just to make sure all was normal. Not everyone heeded my call. A few of the helpers decided to visit their friends in other wings, this being a Saturday. I was gratified to see that my awkward friend was one of these. I reported all the absentees to my superior with the suggestion that they lose their privileged position. The men who had turned up went running for their friends to warn them. I received quite a few desperate apologies over the next hour but I didn’t care. I wanted to make an impression that I wasn’t to be messed with. The absentees lost out and were sent back to live in the wings; after that nobody tried to test me again.

  ***

  I certainly would not have wanted to live there. Prison life is extremely stressful. You wear the same clothes every day. You share a cell at night-time, and during the day a small room, with far too many other men. Imagine trying to sleep at night with all the snoring, groaning and coughing. They even shower together in groups, in open areas. In the day-time you have to use the toilet in front of your room-mates; there is no toilet door, only a wall that is waist high—to prevent suicides. Although, a few years ago if you needed to take a dump when you were in the cell, you had to sit on a wooden bucket and then clean yourself using a bottle of water kept for that purpose. Arguments would start when sleeping inmates were inevitably hit with bits of shit because they were so near the bucket, through lack of floor space. Now we have toilets in the cells along with small bowls of water.

  If you didn’t have any money to supplement basic rations you were in trouble. A prisoner is fed three meals a day for only 27 baht, so it is impossible to serve up decent meals for that amount. Prisoners could lose a serious amount of weight and succumb to every bug and virus going. Vicious fights would break out over the simplest of things, like changing the TV channel. Many prisoners would try to form a group of sorts so that they would be afforded some protection from the bullies. Others would try to strike up an allegiance with a guard. It was all about perception; you had a better chance of surviving if you made yourself look powerful.

  It’s the constant threat of warfare that I could not have coped with. Like anywhere else there are good and bad inmates. The good ones, who had broken the law unintentionally or just the one unl
ucky time, usually took advantage of the vocational training programmes that the jail offered—they could even study for a university degree. They looked for jobs within Bang Kwang and put aside their small earnings in a no-interest savings account. They could then afford to buy food or toiletries at the prison shop, or else they could keep their money for when they had completed their sentence. The bad guys were the ones who were living criminal lives on the outside and only know how to make money from illegal activities. They tried to continue their careers on the inside by organizing gambling rackets. As I said, fights broke out frequently and could be very bloody. If an inmate stole another’s shower gel there could be a stabbing. If someone started to play cards and ended up owing money he could not pay back there could be a stabbing.

  The prison housed a variety of people, among them ‘ladyboys’. These ‘ladyboys’ almost always caused bloody feuds. If an inmate thinks his ‘girlfriend’ (the Thai term of endearment is nong) is being flirted with by another all hell can break loose. The prison guards were on red alert when a new ‘ladyboy’ arrived because it usually meant a battle for the right to gain her hand ‘in matrimony’. They tended to treat their ‘girlfriends’ very well, and shared any food or parcels that they received. In fact the prison prefers not to accept them anymore because it is much too risky for the ladyboy. Their being raped is almost inevitable. They would need 24-hour protection which we would not be able to stretch to. They were usually only guilty of relatively small-time offences like possessing a minor amount of soft drugs or pick-pocketing. The majority of them were prostitutes, though they stopped short of sex. The story was always the same. The client was lured to a room and offered a drink containing sleeping pills. When they would wake a few hours later they would probably be missing their wallets, watch and shoes, if they were expensive. Ladyboys weren’t allowed to wear their hair long in Bang Kwang and when they took a bath they usually wore a grajhom-ok, a garment which covered their breasts if they had any. In Thailand, women wear a skirt high on their body to cover their breasts when bathing in a river, and the ladyboys did the same in Bang Kwang, out of shyness at bathing in front of men.

  They could be good fun and liven up the atmosphere. I remember once when some ‘ladyboys’ put on a show in the auditorium. They got hold of wigs and elaborate dresses and performed the can-can amongst other things. They got a great reception that night and were as excited as chattering four-year-olds who had just received their birthday presents all at once.

  But they can also cause trouble in other ways. An angry prisoner’s wife once complained to a prison guard that her husband was having an affair with a ‘katoey’ (offensive term for ‘ladyboys’). She was enraged and told the guard that her husband didn’t love her anymore, and if that wasn’t bad enough she learnt that all the presents she had brought to him in prison were being given, in turn, to her rival. It was as well that the ‘ladyboy’ was behind bars as the wife was well built and fearsome looking.

  Prison taught me that loneliness will drive a man to do strange things. I remember when one of the inmates decided to try his luck and wrote to a magazine’s dating column. There was great excitement among his cell mates when he received a reply from a woman. He told her that he had been jailed because he accidentally killed the guy who raped his sister—an honourable crime indeed and complete fiction. Anyway the woman believed him and had great sympathy for his dilemma which led to him being in Bang Kwang. She was very eager and after a few letters, which were read aloud to his friends, went back and forth she suggested coming to visit him in prison. Even the prison guards got caught up wondering what she looked like. The date was set and the guy fixed himself up as much as he could, considering the circumstances. Well she exceeded everyone’s expectations, so much that the prisoner panicked. He obviously had no faith in his own appearance and hastily hired a good-looking prisoner to meet with her in his place. It also transpired that he had hired another prisoner to write all his letters for him so the poor girl had not actually dealt with him in any way. He was teased for ages afterwards and couldn’t answer the obvious question; why on earth had he bothered writing to the magazine in the first place?

  ***

  I should probably describe the prison: It’s like a big college campus. As I said, the livestock and vocational training facilities are to the left of the prison’s entrance. They take up a lot of space but then they need to be big as they serve over 8,000 prisoners. On the right is the car park which faces on to the football field. To the extreme right of the football field is the large auditorium, complete with a stage. Behind this is the solitary confinement area which is not really used so much now. If you walk in a straight line from the prison entrance you would pass the visiting rooms on your right and left. You would walk past the 7-storey security tower’s door and then find yourself looking at the wings. There would be a sort of junction where the security tower stands, and just beside that the Custody Section building where I used to have my office. There is another watch tower at the outer wall behind Wing 4.

  There are six wings in total; wings 4, 5 and 6 to your right-hand side and then wings 1, 2 and 3 to your left. Also to your right, just in front of wings 4, 5 and 6 are the two small dormitories for the assistants to the prison guards. Each wing holds between 800 and 1000 prisoners. Wing 1 holds the prisoners who have received the death penalty. Behind wings 1, 2 and 3 is the prison clinic where sick prisoners are kept. If you continue on past the wings you reach a large storage facility which is also used to die clothes. Uniforms, soap, crockery and paint thinners are kept here. Then, if you turn left here you find yourself looking at the kitchen, which is staffed by prisoners from Wing 4.

  Just past the kitchen is the wooden diamond-shaped gazebo where prisoners are brought before their execution. A table is usually set up with flowers and incense to calm the condemned. The execution room is beyond the gazebo, and looks more like a white wooden shed with a large front porch. There is a good bit of green grass around it and under other circumstances it might be described as pretty. The sign over the porch roughly translates into English as ‘the place to end all sorrow’. The morgue is just a tiny room off to the right that was mostly empty. There is a door on the left hand side of the building which is called ‘ghost’s door’ since it is used to bring bodies out into the temple for cremation. There used to be a statue of Yommaban at the entrance to the execution room, and prisoners would have to pass it on their way in. Thais believed that this spirit punished the wicked in the afterlife. Personally I found the statue and the sign to be in extremely poor taste.

  Just beyond then is the Wat Bangpraktai, what you might call a temple—a big building with a red roof which could be clearly seen as you approached the execution room. I suppose it may have proved a comforting sight to a prisoner who was making his last journey. The temple houses the abbot or chaplain and is quite separate from the day-to-day running of the jail. When an execution is to take place a guard would be sent around to invite the abbot to perform the last rites.

  The ‘death row’ Wing has received many visits from journalists and camera crews. Here a journalist speaks to the camera live from the wing with a typical description;

  ‘Right now, I’m standing in the area that houses the prisoners on death row. It’s safe to say that this is the centre of Bang Kwang Prison. There are 280 convicts here, divided among 24 cells. The number of convicts in each cell varies from seven to 15. I am now walking into a room where 14 convicts are kept. The room is about three by seven metres. There is a small toilet here behind a wall that is only waist-high, there is no door. The only other thing in the room is a rubbish bin. The bars of the cell are made of thick metal and they are about four inches apart. The floor is bare cement. Light is provided by fluorescent tubes on the ceiling between the cells, but it is still quite dim.’

  ***

  In Bang Kwang, every morning hundreds of prisoners come out of the cells and they all have
to be searched for drugs, money or weapons. We were helped in this task by our ‘assistants’. We needed them because there just weren’t enough guards to do all that was required.

  Over the years I found a surprising amount of stuff on the prisoners: cash, opium, marijuana, and harder drugs like heroin. Drugs are a huge problem in the prison. Understandably there are a lot of inmates suffering from terrible depression that neither religion nor playing football can help them fight. They turn to drugs for some sort of escape. Then there are the foreign prisoners who complain to their embassies that they can’t sleep. The embassy supplies them with a large batch of sleeping pills—valium and lithium seem to be the drugs of choice— which may indeed be used by the inmate to help him sleep, but more often than not they are sold on to the other prisoners for a profit.

  It’s not a pleasant thing to have to do everyday— give hundreds of men a body search. The inmates are graded according to their behaviour. There is a choice of six grades; very bad, bad, middling, good, very good and excellent. The average inmate usually has a middling score. Anyone who breaks house rules can be punished in a number of ways. He might lose the right to receive visitors or he could be downgraded. Years ago a high grade made you eligible for amnesty if there was a Royal Pardon and your sentence could be cut in half. These pardons used to happen every second year but then the public began to complain that criminals weren’t being jailed for long enough. Nowadays the pardons happen infrequently and sentences can only be reduced by one sixth—unless you are in jail for drug-related offences, in which case you will never be granted amnesty.

  This downgrading usually took place in a court room. I appeared in court as a witness many times. The inmate would be represented by his lawyer and he would grill me as to how the prisoner obtained drugs in his cell. This question was always tricky for me but I would begin by pointing out that the prisoner wasn’t completely isolated from the outside world. He could receive drugs in parcels from friends and relatives. We had already found drugs in strange places like toothpaste and shampoo bottles. Invariably I would find myself admitting that an alternative to parcels from outside was the prison guards themselves. There are corrupt people in all walks of life, it is simply a reality. Some guards could be bribed to collect drugs from suppliers on their days off. It always came down to the same thing—money.