Cyanide Found in Blood of Bangkok Hotel Victims
Cyanide has been found in the blood of all six people who died in a luxury hotel suite in Bangkok, say doctors after examining their bodies.
Based on the initial post-mortem examination, they say there is “no other cause” that would explain their deaths “except for cyanide.”
But they are doing further tests to determine the “intensity” of the deadly chemical and to rule out any other toxins.
Investigators
Forensic investigators had earlier found traces of cyanide on the teacups used by the victims, all of them of Vietnamese origin. Police suspect that one of the dead was behind the poisoning and was driven by crushing debt.
The victims’ lips and nails had turned dark purple indicating ‘a lack of oxygen,’ while their internal organs turned “blood red“, which is another sign of cyanide poisoning, said Professor Kornkiat Vongpaisarnsin of the Department of Forensic Medicine at Chulalongkorn University.
Doctor Chanchai Sittipunt, the dean of the Faculty of Medicine, said they still needed to find out how much cyanide was in the blood of the deceased.
“But from what we have detected – from observation, from internal organ check, from finding cyanide in the blood during the screening test – there is no other cause that would be the factor that would cause their deaths, except for cyanide,” he told reporters.
The deceased were found by housekeepers at the Grand Hyatt Erawan hotel in the Thai capital late on Tuesday.
Investigators believe they had been dead for between 12 and 24 hours by then.
The mystery around the shocking discovery made international headlines.
Thailand’s Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin ordered an urgent investigation into the case, stressing that the deaths were the result of a “private matter“and that there was no suggestion of public danger
Police have since begun to piece together what might have happened.
Two of the six victims had loaned “tens of millions of Thai baht” to another of the deceased for investment purposes, authorities said. Ten million baht is worth nearly $280,000 (£215,000).
Earlier on Wednesday, Deputy Bangkok police chief Gen Noppassin Poonsawat told a press conference the group checked into the hotel separately over the weekend and were assigned five rooms – four on the seventh floor, and one on the fifth.
They had been scheduled to check out on Monday but failed to do so.
Four of the victims are Vietnamese nationals Thi Nguyen Phuong, 46, her husband Hong Pham Thanh, 49, Thi Nguyen Phuong Lan, 47, and Dinh Tran Phu, 37.
The other two are American citizens Sherine Chong, 56, and Dang Hung Van, 55.
The US state department has offered its condolences and said it is “closely monitoring” the situation. The US Federal Bureau of Investigation is assisting Thai authorities in the investigation, Mr Srettha said.
Police say that on Monday afternoon, all six victims gathered in the room on the fifth floor.
The group ordered food and tea, which was delivered to the room around 14:00 local time (08:00 BST) and received by Ms Chong – who was the only person in the room at the time.
According to the deputy police chief, a waiter offered to make tea for the guests, but Ms. Chong refused this. The waiter recalled that she “spoke very little and was visibly under stress,” authorities said.
The waiter later left the room.
The rest of the group then began streaming into the room at various points, between 14:03 and 14:17. No one else is believed to have entered the room apart from the six inside, and police have said the door to the room was locked from within.
Police say there were no signs of a struggle, robbery, or forced entry. They later found traces of cyanide in all six tea cups.
BBC/Shakirat Sadiq
