The Thong Pha Phum District Court, in the Thai province of Kanchanaburi, has sentenced each of the five defendants for the death of an adult tiger and a cub to 4 years and 9 months in prison. The sentence was handed down on Monday, March 6, and includes the order that each of the convicted pay a fine of 5,500 baht (150 euros) and, jointly, financial compensation of 750,000 baht (20,300 euros), for the damage to nature.
The poaching action that has concluded with this sentence that the Thai media consider "exemplary" occurred in January 2022 when a surveillance team from the Thong Pha Phum National Park, in central Thailand, discovered an activity cleaning tiger skins in a forest in Huai Pilok, within the boundaries of the national park
Agents approached the area after detecting smoke from a bonfire but the suspected poachers, alerted by their dogs, fled before they could be caught.
Further investigation led to the arrest, in March 2022, of the five people ultimately charged and convicted, all of whom were residents of the village of Pilok.
The detainees ended up acknowledging the facts but claimed in their defense that they had killed the tigers because they had attacked their cattle, according to the Thai newspaper Bangkok Post.
The initial petition against the defendants was for 9 years and 6 months for each of them, as guilty of multiple counts, including the killing of the tigers, trespassing, possession of carcasses of wild animals and possession of firearms in public. Unlicensed.
The sentence indicates that the defendants, who have lived all their lives in a natural area of great wealth, should be aware of the value of this protected species and not kill the few survivors and try to benefit from the value of their skins. Despite this, the court finally reduced the prison sentences because the defendants had confessed to the responsibility for the acts. In the judgment, in addition to
