POLICE have identified and are chasing a European man and an African American woman for abandoning a baby girl under a rain tree in Udon Thani found by three boys fishing in a drainage canal being bluish-green in colour and unresponsive with a policeman then attempting CPR before transporting her to Udon Thani Hospital where she was pronounced dead, Amarin TV said today (June 11).
After the baby was found wrapped in a pink towel and covered with a blue one under the tree behind Sing Isan warehouse within Don Udom community, the investigation team at Udon Thani police station led by Pol. Col. Pattanawong Chanpol, the superintendent, reviewed CCTV footage which showed that a tall, white, brown-haired foreign man and an African American woman abandoned the infant at 9.20 a.m. yesterday and she was found at 5.30 p.m. the same day.
The surveillance camera clip also showed the couple, who were carrying a bundle and a backpack, walking down a road from a grilled meat restaurant to the bridge at Soi Chintakam, then turning left to the road along the canal behind Wat Thipsantiwan. They stopped in front of a house by the canal, where the CCTV camera was located, and talked for approximately three minutes before abandoning the infant under the tree and fleeing towards Soi Don Udom, without returning the way they came.
Pol. Col. Pattanawong said his team searched hotels, resorts, and guesthouses within a 1-kilometre radius of the spot where the baby was found but no couple with a baby were staying at any of them. However, one hotel near the scene told police that on Monday evening, a foreign man inquired about room prices and when staff told him it was 1,400 baht a night, he declined to stay, saying it was too costly.
After that Nong Khai police contacted Udon Thani police investigators, relating that the man and woman, a 39-year-old European and a 29-year-old American, were seen there carrying a baby girl approximately two weeks old. They performed some kind of ritual at a popular coffee shop before the baby was found abandoned in Udon Thani.
Pol. Col. Pattanawong further revealed that Pol. Sgt. Maj. Charoen Chanrak, a traffic policeman who had quickly reached the spot where the baby was found, said she was warm but had no pulse. He performed CPR for approximately 15 minutes before transferring her to Udon Thani Hospital where she was pronounced dead.
Udon Thani police investigators contacted Immigration Police in Nong Khai to check if the couple had left the country but while it was ascertained they had not departed via the Friendship Bridge border checkpoint, unofficial border crossings were still being checked.
Even so, police believe they are still in Thailand and are searching for them to prosecute under the law.
CAPTION:
A screengrab image showing the couple leaving the baby girl beneath a tree, above and Front Page, and Pol. Col. Pattanawong Chanpol discussing the case, inserted. Photos – Amarin TV
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