Cyanide found in teacups shared by six dead in Bangkok hotel | Thailand

Police are investigating the deaths of six people found in a room at a luxury hotel in central Bangkok. They believe that one member of the group poisoned himself and others with cyanide.

Initial tests found cyanide, a deadly chemical that interferes with the body’s ability to absorb oxygen, in a teapot, six cups and in the blood of one of the dead, police said. Based on conversations with a relative, they believe the deaths may be related to a business dispute.

The dead were Vietnamese and two of them were American citizens, according to Thai authorities. The FBI is assisting in the investigation.

Thai police believe the poisonings occurred on Monday afternoon after the group ordered food and English tea to their room on the fifth floor of the Grand Hyatt Erawan hotel in Bangkok’s business district.

When room service staff arrived, they saw only one of the six people, a 56-year-old woman, police said. She accepted the food and drinks and told hotel staff there was no need to serve the tea, according to Noppasin Poonsawat, deputy chief of the Metropolitan Police Bureau.

Shortly afterwards, CCTV footage showed all six members of the group gathering outside the room and then entering it. That was the last time they were seen alive.

“It all started after 1:57 p.m. (Monday) after hotel staff brought six teacups, a milk pot and two thermos flasks into the room. We found cyanide on the six cups. According to CCTV, no one except the six members of the group entered the room, and none of them were seen leaving after 2:17 p.m.,” Noppasin said.

The group of three women and three men were found dead the following Tuesday afternoon. They were discovered by a member of the housekeeping staff after they were late for check-out.

The plates containing the food they had ordered appeared to have been left untouched and were still wrapped in plastic wrap. Their luggage was packed. Police said no illegal materials were found in their luggage, which was searched throughout the night.

The media named the group as Vietnamese citizen Thi Nguyen Phuong (46), her husband Hong Pham Thanh (49), Thi Nguyen Phuong Lan (47) and Dinh Tran Phu (37), as well as US citizens Sherine Chong (56) and Dang Hung Van.

Police are currently examining additional video surveillance footage to reconstruct a timeline of their stay in Bangkok. The FBI was assisting in the investigation because two of the people were American citizens, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said.

Srettha said the case was not related to terrorism and a meeting with the Russian energy minister scheduled to take place at the same hotel on Wednesday was unlikely to be affected. “The incident has nothing to do with terrorism or lack of security measures, so I think everything will go according to plan,” he said.

Police were searching for a seventh person who was included in the group’s booking but had not come forward. However, on Wednesday, police said the seventh person was the younger sister of one of the women and had returned to Vietnam before the incident.

Police said two members of the group, the married couple, had lent another member of the group 10 million baht ($278,025/£233,186) to invest in a business project to build a hospital in Japan and there appeared to be a dispute over the money. The couple ran a construction company in Vietnam.

Further information on the amount of cyanide absorbed is expected on Wednesday afternoon.

The US State Department is “closely monitoring the situation and stands ready to provide consular assistance,” a spokesman said.

This is not the first high-profile murder involving cyanide in Thailand. Last year, a Thai woman accused of poisoning people with cyanide was charged with 14 counts of murder, making it one of the worst cases of serial killing in the country.