They would be charged under Article 161 of the Excise Act, which makes it a crime to possess a car that didn’t pay full tax.

The investigators and state attorneys had requested the Excise Department to calculate the tax liability and were waiting for the results before taking legal action, said Paisit Wongmuang, director-general of the DSI.

The title to this reassembled car was once under the name of acting supreme patriarch Somdet Phra Maha Ratchamangalacharn, who is the abbot of Pak Nam Phasi Charoen Temple.

Laymen Kasemsak Pawangkhanant, Metheenan or Chalat Nitithitiwong and Somneuk Boonprapai are already facing charges of conspiring to evade tax and providing false information in connection with the registration of the Benz.

The meeting also resolved that evidence suggested that two people, Pichai Weerasitthikul and Wasu Jittipattanakulchai, were accomplices of Kasemsak.