A southern judge who dramatically shot himself in court last year to protest injustice killed himself this morning.
Five months after Kanakorn Pianchana delivered a diatribe against interference in the justice system before shooting himself in his courtroom in the Deep South province of Yala, he shot himself again this morning at a home in Chiang Mai province, this time fatally.
Kanakorn left a note saying that after the October incident, he had been placed under investigation by the Court of Justice and accused of a criminal offense. He did not go into details.
“March 6-7 is a blessed day,” he wrote. “It’s been a week that my kid’s stayed home from school. It’s my time to go now.”
Judge who shot himself over Thai injustice recovers as his words echo
Back in October, the judge had posted a 25-page statement online describing his concerns about senior interfering in his case.
He had just delivered a verdict acquitting five Muslim suspects in a murder case when he gave an impassioned speech streamed over Facebook Live before shooting himself in the chest with a handgun. The wound proved not to be fatal.
Kanakorn said he had been ordered to sentence three to die and give the remaining two life sentences.
“If I followed the order of the director, it would result in the first, third and fourth defendants getting the death penalty, which is only for premeditated killing … and the second and fifth defendants, as conspirators, facing life sentences,” he wrote at the time.
Addressing the court, he cited a lack of “clear and credible evidence, saying that “the judicial process needs to be transparent and credible… punishing wrong people makes them scapegoats.”
“Return verdicts to the judge, return justice to the people,” was one widely cited sentence from his manifesto.
