‘I wanna go home’ says British ‘punk’ caught in Thailand’s legal red tape

[Admin]

Back from hell - Pattaya horror story revisited

He has made an incredibly recovery after treatment at a psychiatric hospital in Bangkok. And remarkably it was a private British citizen who came to his aid after seeing pictures of Hewitt up on this website.

The British Embassy had seemingly written him off as either a ‘feckless’ Brit or perhaps as one Embassy employee apparently described him, unofficially and not without cause - ‘a nutter’.

But now his faculties have returned and Hewitt describes himself as ‘The luckiest man in the world’

And from a world in which he thought he had no cash he has emerged to a world where he is rich well beyond the imagination of his paranoiac alter ego with many millions of Thai baht in his bank account.

He puts his good fortune down to his saviour Tracy Cosgrave, of the charity Melissa Cosgrave Children’s Foundation, who rushed down to Pattaya Police station, had him dressed and fed and persuaded police to send him to a psychiatric hospital.

He is also deeply grateful to his landlord Bunchai Thaiurungrattana at his apartment in Pattaya 3rd Road, Soi 16, who safeguarded his belongings, cash and bank books, until he made his recovery.

For Richard Hewitt is not a Pattaya Brit who has squandered all his cash on booze, women, and drugs… Well, at least not yet.

He is in fact wealthy in his own right. A computer engineer, and graduate from the University of Sheffield, he has in fact lived in Thailand for on and off for 12 years and says he has visited ‘and stayed in’ 56 provinces.

He was an English language teacher for Berlitz in Bangkok until four years ago when he quit after his father died and he received a large inheritance.

And it is that inheritance which may have been his undoing. That and perhaps moving to Pattaya with little sense of self control.

“I decided someone would have to make me a pretty good offer if I was ever going to work again,” he said, talking about his inheritance. “That was my downfall”.

Instead he decided to make most of his life in a city once described by Britain’s ‘Observer’ as a modern day Sodom and Gomorrah.

Hewitt, 47, from Brownhills, Birmingham, drank, took drugs, and frequented the city’s sex bars.

His last arrival date from Britain was in the third week of August last year. He resumed his normal lifestyle but insists he quit drugs, and drink by early October.

Nevertheless the damage appeared to have been done. Something somewhere cracked, and he has now only partial memory of what happened. Doctors put it down to paranoiac psychosis.

He does remember dreaming about water, ‘Rain making’ and ‘Rain Dancing’, so much so that he turned on all the taps to flood his apartment and others in the block and he became delirious turning his room into an open toilet.

He scratched around looking for food, oblivious of the US$2000. 200 pounds sterling, 3000 baht and bank books in his safe.

Read more:
http://www.andrew-drummond.com/2011/02/02/back-from-hell-pattaya-horror-story-revisited/

[Admin]

‘I wanna go home’ says British ‘punk’ caught in Thailand’s legal red tape
Published by Andrew Drummondon March 31, 2011in The Times.
From Andrew Drummond, Bangkok,
March 31 2011

Five months after he was found wasting away chained to cell bars in Pattaya police station Briton Richard Hewitt has still not been allowed home, because of legal complications which have delayed a simple case of overstaying his visa.

Hewitt, 48, from Brownhills, Birmingham, now revealed in his youth as being a guitarist and singer with the British group ‘Isobel Barnett and the Shoplifters’, was rescued from the cells of Pattaya Police station last November, after pleas to the British Consular department were ignored, and expat Tracey Cosgrove, of the Melissa Cosgrove Children’s Foundation read about his plight on this site.

Hewitt who was naked, incoherent and in a filthy state, was washed, fed, and taken to a psychiatric hospital in Bangkok for treatment, and when he was finally released, it emerged he was wealthy in his own right, a graduate of Sheffield University in England and a qualified computer engineer. He paid all his own hospital and legal costs.

Hewitt had fallen victim to pretty much all the vices Pattaya had to offer but since his release , he says, now back in Pattaya he has been living a quiet life.

The Office of the Attorney General has so far not been able to complete a case against him (he overstayed his visa for about a month while suffering a nervous breakdown) and he has been told it could months before the court is ready to deal with it.

“I just want to go home and see my mum who is elderly,” said Hewitt. “I’m ready. I have picked up the two guitars my landlord was holding for me, but it could be at least June before I can go.

“I have money so it’s not so bad. But what would happen in such a case where the person has no money to live off and how would the Embassy deal with it. It does not bear thinking about.”

Source:
http://www.andrew-drummond.com/2011/03/31/%e2%80%98i-wanna-go-home%e2%80%99-says-british-%e2%80%98punk%e2%80%99-caught-in-thailand%e2%80%99s-legal-red-tape/

[Admin]

Feckless Briton deported from Thailand
From ANDREW DRUMMOND
andrew-drummond.com 2011-08-01

A British computer engineer, who was left to languish in a Thai jail, naked, emaciated, chained to the bars and close to death after suffering a mental breakdown, was deported to Britain early Saturday.

Richard Hewitt, 49, had been arrested wandering incoherently in the Thai resort of Pattaya last November after falling victim to its offerings of sex, drugs, and alcohol. He said before his departure that he had been asked by British Embassy officials not to talk to the media about his plight.

One of those who found him said it looked like he had been ‘left to die’. But the Foreign Office said he had been afforded full ‘consular assistance’.

On taking up his post as the new Ambassador to Thailand Asif Ahmad announced that more funds were available for Britons in trouble abroad. But that may not include what he described as ‘feckless Brits’. The Embassy has not confirmed Hewitt fitted that category.

But they may have been given false information about his background.

Hewitt, in his days a guitarist with 'Isobell Barnett and the Shoplifters' had been chained for two weeks without even being brought to court. What food he had was consumed by other inmates who had also attacked him. But he did not care, as he admitted later, he has long since lost any grasp on reality.

After (but not necessarily as a result of) a furor on expatriate forums in Thailand caused by publication of the pictures of Hewitt on andrew-drummond.com the British Embassy sent its Honorary Consul in Pattaya, Howard Miller, back to the police station.

But Hewitt had already been saved by a British expatriate charity worker Tracy Cosgrove, of the Melissa Cosgrove Foundation, who had rushed to the police station as soon as she heard the news and had Hewitt washed, dressed, fed and clothed [more...]

Full story:
http://www.andrew-drummond.com/view-story.php?sid=424

[jones the rice]

I myself think if you live by the sword then you die by the sword.
i feel no remorse for this man,he was not put in prison for nothing.
you play with fire you get burnt.

[smithy99]

Every human being in this world deserves some form of help

So easy to slag someone off

Addictions  whether they be drink,drugs or gambling are not easy to overcome.

Nice for the ones sitting in their ivory towers casting aspertions

[jones the rice]

Every human being in this world deserves some form of help

So easy to slag someone off

Addictions  whether they be drink,drugs or gambling are not easy to overcome.

Nice for the ones sitting in their ivory towers casting aspertions

brake the law except what comes.
if you cannot do the time,don't do the CRIME.

[Murtle_71]

Every human being in this world deserves some form of help

So easy to slag someone off

Addictions  whether they be drink,drugs or gambling are not easy to overcome.

Nice for the ones sitting in their ivory towers casting aspertions

brake the law except what comes.
if you cannot do the time,don't do the CRIME.

innocent until proven guilty

its always the nice way to play

[binnsy]

2000 Dollars
200 GBP
3000 Baht

With the money he has whats stopping him from getting a oneway ticket back?.
  He can claim the social security when he gets back along with all the others with Drug/Drink problems.

[jones the rice]

2000 Dollars
200 GBP
3000 Baht

With the money he has whats stopping him from getting a oneway ticket back?.
  He can claim the social security when he gets back along with all the others with Drug/Drink problems.

well said binnsy from his own mouth i spent my money on drink drugs and girlie bars,well if you that money and you spend it,why should someone else pay for your ticket home.should have left him where he was.

[jones the rice]

Every human being in this world deserves some form of help

So easy to slag someone off

Addictions  whether they be drink,drugs or gambling are not easy to overcome.

Nice for the ones sitting in their ivory towers casting aspertions

brake the law except what comes.
if you cannot do the time,don't do the CRIME.

innocent until proven guilty

its always the nice way to play

i spent my money on DRINK and DRUGS witch i think is against the law in thailand and girlie bars,guilty as charged should have got a 10 year just for the drugs.

[candy]

Nobody is perfect.We all make mistakes.I think this poor man needs some help and of course some love and tenderness. 

[Starman]

'judge not lest you be judged'.

[jones the rice]

'judge not lest you be judged'.

been judged paid the price.

[jones the rice]

Nobody is perfect.We all make mistakes.I think this poor man needs some help and of course some love and tenderness. 

if i did not know you i would say to make a statement like that you must be off your head,but as i know you so well i already know your off your head.
in my honest opinion i would throw away the key

[jeff]

Nice for the ones sitting in their ivory towers casting aspertions

Wouldn't this come natural to those whom resided in the ivoriest of towers?