boing boing and the New York Times both tell me that the Thai Police caught the swirly-faced, internationally hunted child molester who apparently abused boys in Vietnam and Cambodia, and taught English in Thailand. From the NYT article: “His was the latest highly publicized arrest of foreigners accused of abusing children in Southeast Asia. They include the British rock star Gary Glitter, who was imprisoned in Vietnam last year, and John Mark Karr, who falsely claimed to have killed the American child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey.”

I’m kind of glad they’re prosecuting him here first. I think it’s a good good thing to show the world that SE Asia doesn’t tolerate sexual predators, after decades of having an international reputation as a paradise for such characters.

Despite the fact that Thailand is unfortunately an infamous refuge for paedophiles and other criminals, I couldn’t believe it when I heard a man in Bangkok was arrested for the 10 year-old murder of JonBenet Ramsey. My second thought was “I hope the FBI doesn’t leave this investigation to the Thai police.”

His name is John Mark Karr and he lived at The Blooms on Soi Sribamphen Yen-Arkard off Sathorn, and taught English at one of the international schools (no one has revealed which one). Despite his confession to Immigration Police, a cloud of suspicion looms over whether the confession is a hoax; in my opinion, a desperate attempt by everyone to get their 15 minutes of fame.

First of all, who arrests a paedophile-murderer and then hands him the microphone like a celebrity for a global press conference? If there was anyone desperate enough for fame or notoriety, clearly confessing to a violent crime in Thailand is the way to get it.

And it’s not just Karr. Immigration Police LTG Suwat Tumrongsiskul, pulling out all the stops to make his department look good, beamed in the spotlight, smiling and laughing through the press conference. After telling everyone Karr was arrested for first degree murder, he admitted he didn’t know what “first degree murder” meant or its difference from second degree murder.

To better understand the hype this case received in the States, consider some of its oddities:
JonBenet appears as a bizarre “child-woman,” provocatively dressed and caked in makeup at the age of 2 by her multimillionaire parents obsessed with freakish child beauty pagents. On Christmas Day, they find a ransom note asking for the exact amount of the father’s Christmas bonus in return for their daughter. But a week later, the parents find their daughter strangled and raped in their basement; she is in the house the whole time. The parents refuse to cooperate with investigators, and they, and even their older son, become the prime suspects. But for 10 years, a break was never made.