Six dismembered and decomposing body parts were found on a burned mattress in a Chiang Mai house at the weekend, belonging to the victim Suree On-sanit, aged 46 and the owner of a massage spa.
Her husband, 41-year old Phiphat Kanthima, has allegedly confessed to the crime, reports the Nation, and was arrested after he was found posing as a monk at a local monastery on Monday evening.
Phiphat had lived with the victim for a number of years in Muang Chiang Mai district and had recently left Thailand to work in construction in Turkey. During his time away, he apparently sent Suree a portion of his earnings – thought to total around ฿1 million – which, upon his return back to Thailand, he discovered she had invested part of in her Jasmine Massage Spa. He believed the remainder of his earnings to be missing also.
Tensions came to a head of 4 February, according to the Bangkok Post, when Phiphat discovered a number of Line messages on Suree’s mobile phone that indicated she was having flirtatious conversations with another man. A fight broke out between the pair with Phiphat accusing Suree of sending his money to the other man. Phiphat claims that Suree drew a knife on him – when he tried to snatch it from her hands, it accidentally slipped and killed her.
Phiphat then apparently dismembered the body into six pieces with the intention of disposing the parts in the Ping River – in a gruesome flashback to the recent case of the dismembered body parts found in the Chao Phraya river – but decided eventually to burn her body instead after hurting his hand during the dismemberment.
In a bid to make it look as though Suree’s death had come about after being caught in a house fire, Phiphat then started a small fire in the room where he left her body parts atop a mattress, hoping it would spread and consume the rest of the property. In actuality, only a small part of the room itself was burned, and Suree’s body parts were found alongside a couple of knives.
The parts were found after police responded to complaints that a foul smell was emanating from the house.
Featured image is of Chiang Mai and is by by Rex Gray
