Online gambling ring busted in Nakhon Sawan

Police inspect seized computers and other devices after a raid on a house in Muang district of Nakhon Sawan that served as an online gambling hub. (Photo: Chalit Pumruang)

NAKHON SAWAN: Five men have been arrested in Nakhon Sawan on charges of operating a website for a major online gambling network that had more than one billion baht in circulation, police said on Saturday.

Officers from the Police Cyber Taskforce (PCT) and local police raided the two-storey house in tambon Wat Sai in Muang district on Saturday afternoon, acting on information that its occupants were linked to the gambling website ZDC789, which had a server overseas and several operations in Thailand.

The officers arrested five men inside the house and seized eight computers, one laptop computer, 13 mobile phones, three internet routers and two bank account passbooks, with a combined worth of 520,000 baht. The gambling operation had about 200 million baht in circulation, according to the arresting team.

Officers learned that the house had been rented for 22 months and are now checking to determine who rented it.

Pol Maj Gen Trairong Phiewphan, head of the PCT team, said the raid in Nakhon Sawan was one of four carried out on gambling operations on Saturday. Two other sites were raided in Phitsanulok and one in Bangkok.

The operation in Nakhon Sawan was found to have taken bets for many kinds of gambling – baccarat, high-low dice and other card games, said Pol Maj Gen Trairong. It also served as a venue for money withdrawals and deposits and offered consultation services to gamblers.

According to Pol Maj Gen Trairong, the ring was responsible for a major online gambling network with more than 500,000 customers and one billion baht in circulation. The investigation is now being extended to trace the money trail and arrest others involved, he said.