Police said the suspect, identified in an arrest warrant as Poompui Kesanuch, had used a knife to threaten the 25-year-old woman, then punched and raped her at the back of the hospital building where she had brought bed sheets for laundering about 8.30pm on Sunday.

Nong Khai Immigration chief Pol Colonel Pallop Suriyakul Na Ayudhaya said provincial police had submitted Poompui’s arrest warrant to border checkpoint officers. He had already asked his subordinates to contact their Lao counterparts to help locate the suspect.

On Wednesday morning, deputy superintendent Pol Lt-Colonel Atthasak Siripanich led a team to the Wat Sri Boon Reung pier on the bank of Mekong River, where they were told that Poompui stole a water scooter from a local club and rode it towards Laos. A scooter, along with a life vest, was found drifting near the Lao shore on Tuesday morning by a fisherman who then alerted the club president, Nipon Polwiset.

Nipon told police that he was confident Poompui stole the water scooter because he often hung around the pier and watched them.

Police said that Poompui – who was described as a homeless man keen on drinking alcohol and picking fights when drunk – has a Lao father and a Thai mother, so they believe he has fled to stay with his father.

It was also reported that Poompui had fled to Laos in 2012 after her assaulted an elderly person from whom he had tried to extort money to buy alcohol. This attack led to the victim’s death.

The suspect returned to Nong Khai in 2015, and was captured and jailed for four months for that crime. He was released on grounds of mental illness.

In May, Poompui allegedly raped a woman who went looking for crabs in a rice field.

The accused woman, Parita Jai-aree, maintained she was innocent.

Uttaradit’s Tha Pla superintendent Pol Col Somneuk Makmee said Parita was apprehended at 2am on Wednesday at her rented home in Khamphaeng Phetch province.

The warrant involved a drug bust in May after police identified Parita as the sender of a parcel containing two grams of crystal meth or “ice” from Nonthaburi that was delivered to a recipient in Tha Pla.

Parita is in a limelight due to separate child abuse case after she filed a complaint earlier this month with outspoken lawyer Songkran Atchariyasap about a former military man’s alleged abuse of her young son.

She claimed the boy’s serious burns on his mid section were caused in January by the former military man whom she had hired to take care of her son since he was nine months old.

She claimed the boy’s injuries were caused by the man’s punishment method of placement of a bag of boiling water onto the boy for a long period of time, while the boy’s hands were tied.

She said she had already filed a police complaint about the abuse.

The story drew sympathy when she told it on a televised show on July 11 and Bt2 million was donated to help pay the boy’s medical expenses.

The boy is scheduled for a major surgery on September 19.

Facebook user Mindva Wiranchana has warned others about the dangers of overcharging the device.

A power bank is essentially an external battery that can be plugged into a smartphone or tablet for additional power.

Images shared on Facebook show a heap of electrical cables with at least two extension leads which appear to be plugged into one another.

The woman claimed her power bank exploded after she left it charging all night.

However, images shared on Facebook show a heap of electrical cables with at least two extension leads which appear to be plugged into one another.

The images were showed the burnt power bank and a large burnt patch on the floor, suggest that the device was perhaps not being charged as intended.

It is not clear what caused the power bank to explode. However, it is likely it exploded due to some specific problem with particular device.

It also wasn’t clear if this particular power bank was certified and met safety standards or if it was a cheap knock off, the kind of which are commonly found on sale in Thailand.

Last year, a study in the UK warned of the dangers of using counterfeit chargers.

Out of 400 counterfeit chargers purchased from suppliers around the world, 397 were found to fail a basic safety test.

Common problems with the fakes included non-sleeved plugs, with metal pins and live parts exposed and only basic insulation in use, all of which increase the chances of electric shock.

The incident took place at 8.30am on Wednesday in front of a Happy drinking water factory in Phitsanulok’s Muang district.

The body of Porntip Thimasan, 41, was found under the submerged Nissan pickup truck’s front section

Police had rescue workers remove drinking water bottles loaded on the truck and pulled it out of the rice field to retrieve the body.

The initial investigation found that Porntip was about to get into the truck to deliver bottled water when it began rolling towards the rice paddy.

Police concluded that the woman tried to stop the truck’s momentum by pushing it from the front but it ran her over and pinned her in the water.

Her body was sent for an autopsy at Buddhachinaraj Hospital and was expected to be released for religious rituals later.

The bodies of Pattaya expat Pieter Hoovers, 54, and his Thai wife were found in an apartment in Amsterdam’s Ceintuurbaan on Monday.

Dutch police said the couple met a violent death and died in suspicious circumstances.

Police were called by Hoovers’ relatives after the couple had not been seen for a couple of days.

Hoovers had owned the Hoek van Holland restaurant in Jomtien from 2002 and had lived in Pattaya since the late 1990’s. More recently had been dividing his time between Thailand and Holland.

Dutch media reports that Hoovers was a well-known figure in the Amsterdam music scene and had also competed to a high standard in martial arts.

A report in Het Parool claims that Hoovers had links to the criminal world in both Holland and Thailand.

After further investigation, authorities concluded that the deceased man, security guard Chitchai Phetchsimoung, 44, had killed the two victims before driving his vehicle into a head-on collision with a truck transporting liquid natural gas (LNG), resulting to his instant death at Bu Krasang Intersection. Chitchai reportedly had a history of mental illness.

The driver of the truck, Sommai Songpat, 46, who waited for police at the scene of the crash, told them that Chitchai’s speeding sedan had overtaken another 10-wheel truck by swerving into his lane. Sommai said he tried to avoid the oncoming car but was unable to do so.

Pol Captain Thewin Surasoon of the Thab Mai precinct subsequently visited Chitchai’s home to inform his family about the fatal crash and found the bodies of Chitchai’s wife, Samruay Chaisiri, 49, and her daughter from a previous marriage, Wassana Suksamran, 10, in a pool of blood in a bedroom. Police also found the suspected murder weapon, a 50-centimetre knife, and a bottle of pesticides and traces of vomit near the bodies.

Police said they suspected Chitchai had killed the Samruay and the child and then unsuccessfully tried to commit suicide by drinking the pesticide, adding that he might have then deliberately killed himself by crashing into the LNG truck.

Janepob Veeraporn, 37, will have his driving license revoked for life.

The Court initially ruled to jail Janepob for five years but reduced the sentence to 2 years and six months as the defendant confessed.

Janepob’s Mercedes slammed at high speed into the back of a Ford sedan carrying Thanthapat Horsaengchai, 34, and Kritsana Thaworn, 32, on Phahlyothin Road in Ayutthaya’s Bang Pa-in district on March 13.

The Ford burst into flames and both post-graduate students were killed.

It is not known whether Janepob will be granted bail or not.

Thairath Online reported that Chotika Ketsit went to see her mother, Nipha Khongma, 67, at a reception home for homeless people in Sukhothai on Tuesday after learning that Nipha had been arrested and taken to the reception house.

Nipha and her husband, Khoon Kaewket, 73, were arrested while begging at the Phitsanulok railway station on Monday. A Facebook page of the Sukhothai community posted her story that went viral and caught Chotika’s attention.

When she met her mother at the reception home, Chotika wept and kowtowed at Nipha’s feet and hugged her. She asked: “Mom, do you remember me? Mom, do you remember me?” But the old woman kept shaking her head.

When Chotika said: “It’s me Renu”, the old woman nodded and became confident it was her daughter that she had not seen for many years.

Nipha said she has never told anyone that her daughter was called Renu when she gave the girl away to be adopted.

Chotika said that she learned from her foster parents that her mother took her from her home in Sukhothai to Bangkok when she was three-years-old after her father died.

Her mother was a construction worker and had a miserable life so she gave Chotika as an adopted daughter to a construction contractor.

She said her mother visited her until she was in Grade 4 then she disappeared. She was told her mother returned to Phitsanulok to live with a new husband.

Chotika said she left her foster parent’s when she was 12 to live on her own by working as a house maid and restaurant helper .

She studied in the non-formal education school until she finished Grade 9 and later became a supporting actress for the Samsien Co Ltd and has been acting in some TV series.

She said she has been searching for her mother for years until she learned about her plight on Facebook.

The ruling is due to be delivered at 8.30am.

The trial began in 2015 as suspected syndicates were accused of trafficking migrants, notably ethnic Rohingya, to Thailand and via the Kingdom to other destinations.

Thai and Myanmar citizens were arrested that year following the discovery of a mass grave in jungle shelters in the border district of Sadao, in Songkhla province, used by traffickers to hold the migrants.

Investigations indicated a number of security officials as well as Thai and Myanmar civilians had taken the migrants – originally from Bangladesh and western Myanmar – to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

The case attracted international attention to the regional migrant crisis across the Indian Ocean, and countries were criticised for ignoring the problem.

Thailand was then downgraded to the lowest level – Tier 3 – in the US State Department’s “Trafficking in Persons” (TIP) report in both 2014 and 2015.

The Thai government has since taken a number of measures, including amendment of its trafficking law and the creation of a special division in the Criminal Court to handle human-trafficking cases in particular.

Wednesday’s ruling is the first such case for the new division.

Thailand, meanwhile, remains on the Watch List in Washington’s annual TIP report.

Apiwan Satabundit is charged with pre-meditated murder, destroying the body of the victim, Warisara Klinjui, to cover up the crime, and taking the victim’s belongings.

But Apiwan has denied killing Warisara and admitted to just being present at the crime scene alongside self-confessed murderer Priyanuch Nonwangchai.

“There was no motive for Apiwan to kill the victim,” lawyer Boonyong Kaewfainok said yesterday.

Recruited by Apiwan’s father, Boonyong is preparing to represent Apiwan in court.

The lawyer gave an interview after talking to Apiwan for about one hour at Khon Kaen Prison, where she has been locked up pending trial.

“Although Apiwan is close to Priyanuch, there is still no reason for her to murder Warisara,” Boonyong said. “She didn’t even hit the victim.”

Apiwan’s father, Somsak Sattayabundit, said his daughter had not plotted to kill Warisara and neither had she played a role in the fatal assault.

“I am not going to say that she is innocent because she was at the crime,” Somsak said. But, he added, she had no motive to commit murder.

The shocking crime took place in Khon Kaen province in May. After it became big news, Apiwan, Priyanucha and another suspect fled to Myanmar. However, they later turned themselves in.

Of the several suspects implicated in the crime, only Priyanuch has confessed to the killing.