Following the 3pm report of an inmate’s extra-judicial killing, Prachacheun police officers found the body of Mae Hong Son native Pichit Chokpakchitporn, 32, at the prison fence.

A police probe found that the inmate tried to escape while others were taking a shower. He got out of his cell and climbed over the first and second ring fences when prison guards spotted him.

He disregarded guards shouting at him to stop and surrender as he was about to climb over the third outer fencer. He was shot and killed instantly by a guard to stop the jailbreak.

His body was sent to the Institute of Forensic Medicine, Police General Hospital for an autopsy.

Pichit was arrested on November 23, 2016, after being found with 170,000 yaba pills and three kilograms of crystal meth or “ice” in Mae Hong Son’s Pai district. He was transporting the drugs, worth Bt40 million, in a sedan for the Hmong drug trafficking ring, which is led by alleged drug baron Laota Sanli.

The 79-year-old Laota was arrested on October last year in Chiang Mai’s Mae Ai border district together with 13 others for narcotic smuggling.