Pol Major Sahatwat Panket, an inspector at the RTP Office of Human Resources, was described in a police journal in August as a young policeman in the capital with working experience in the deep South who had inspired other officials.

He was determined to change the public’s negative view towards police to foster a better understanding in a more positive light “by working hard” and by “his sincere smile”, |the report stated.

The Bangkok native started as a police investigator at Pattani’s Yarang precinct in 2010 and was transferred in May 2014 to handle human resources, which required him to attend to regulations details while working within deadlines. The inspector had been working at the Bangkok headquarters for about a year.

The journal also quoted his motto as “never scale down your dreams, but scale up your attempts to achieve your goal”.

Police found Sahatwat’s lifeless body with a gunshot wound to the head at around 8am in his office on the seventh floor of the RTP’s fifth building. A 9mm pistol was found near his body along with a suicide note that read: “Forgive me, it is because of too much depression.”

RTP deputy spokesman Pol Colonel Kritsana Pattanacharoen said national police chief Pol General Chakthip Chaijinda had sent his condolences to Sahatwat’s family, while describing the deceased as a hardworking and determined officer.

The police chief ordered officers to provide the family with welfare and assistance funds.

Sahawat is just the latest apparent suicide case in the police ranks – the profession is believed to be at least twice the normal risk of committing suicide compared to other fields, according to an article by the Chiang Mai-based Thai Civil Rights and Investigative Journalism (TCIJ) in June last year.  The TCIJ reported that 279 policemen had committed suicide from 2008 to May 2016, while 260 suicides were committed between 2000 and 2015.

That meant an average of 32.5 suicide cases per year with a ratio of 13.6 suicides per 100,000 officers in the force – more than double that of the country’s general suicide rate as of 2014 at 6.08 per 100,000 population.

Based on news reports, at least 10 officers have committed suicide this year including Sahatwat, with most incidents linked to stress over work, personal issues or illness.

In addition to general triggers that could drive anyone to suicide, policemen have ready access to guns, with 80 per cent of police suicides involving guns while 13 per cent involved hanging.

Officers are also subjected to stress due to heavy workloads and reported pressure from supervisors, while seeking psychiatric help for mental issues involved worries about blemishes on work records that could affect career advancement and job security, according to the TCIJ.