Si Quey Sae-ung, a Chinese-born gardener, was arrested in Rayong province in January 1958 over the death of an eight-year-old boy, Somboon Boonyakan. Police then linked him to a series of child killings in other provinces that had gone unsolved since 1954, and he was reported to have confessed to them. He was tried in Bangkok that spring, sentenced to death on appeal and executed at Bang Kwang prison in September 1959. For decades he was a figure that Thai parents invoked to frighten children. In the 2010s a different view took hold among historians, human rights campaigners and the residents of the district where he had lived: that a poor migrant who spoke little Thai had been handed the blame for crimes the police could not otherwise solve.
What the courts decided is disputed. Some outlets say he pleaded guilty to every count and was sentenced on all of them. Others say he was convicted only of the Rayong killing, and that the other deaths were admitted or accused but never the basis of a verdict. His body was cremated on July 23, 2020, after the museum that had held it withdrew it from display.
Khaosod English, in a long 2016 feature, says Si Quey was born in 1927 into a farming family in Shantou, a port in southern China. In 1945 he was conscripted to fight in the war against Japan. Matichon, a Thai daily, gives a different picture: it puts his birth around 1921 and says he left China to avoid military service. Both agree that he entered Thailand in 1946. Khaosod English says he arrived on a cargo ship that docked at Khlong Toei port on December 28, 1946.
He did menial jobs in Bangkok before moving to Prachuap Khiri Khan province, on the Gulf of Thailand south of the capital, where he worked as a gardener in Thap Sakae district. He spoke very little Thai, a fact that runs through every later account of his case. The Bangkok Post gives his age at death as 32, which fits a birth in 1927.
Between 1954 and 1957 a series of children were killed in several places. Khaosod English lists five cases before the Rayong one, all attributed to Si Quey in the police case against him: in Prachuap Khiri Khan in 1954 and 1955, in Bangkok in 1954 and in Nakhon Pathom in February 1957. The Standard, a Thai news site, describes the same group as four cases in Prachuap Khiri Khan, one in Bangkok and one in Nakhon Pathom, one more than Khaosod English counts. MGR Online, another Thai outlet, lists six earlier incidents and says one of them, in Thap Sakae in April 1954, involved a girl who survived. The Bangkok Post reports that a girl who survived an attack said Si Quey was not the person who attacked her.
The victims in these earlier cases were children aged between five and eleven, according to the South China Morning Post, which says police described all of them as ethnic Chinese.
For part of this period the police had another suspect. Khaosod English reports that a Thai butcher, S. P., was identified by police as the person responsible, was held for nearly a year, and was released on bail in January 1958, a month before Si Quey's arrest. Police briefly considered charging him as an accomplice and dropped the idea for lack of evidence, the article says. The butcher's mother told a newspaper at the time, in the outlet's words, that the family had lost a great deal of money.
Somboon Boonyakan, eight, was killed in Rayong province in January 1958. Khaosod English says the boy's father and others held Si Quey until police arrived. The arrest was reported in the Thai press about a week later.
Investigators noticed how closely the Rayong case resembled the earlier ones. Khaosod English says forensic science was almost unused in Thai police work at the time, so police relied on witness descriptions and on the similarity between the cases. Psychiatrists who examined Si Quey at the time found no mental disorder, the same article says.
Si Quey was reported to have confessed to the Rayong killing and to the earlier cases. The Bangkok Post says he confessed after his arrest in Rayong in 1958. The Standard says that police obtained his confession to at least six other cases from 1954 to 1958, besides the Rayong charge.
Because he spoke so little Thai, he could not speak directly with police or judges. Khaosod English quotes the Rayong police commander, Maj. Teekayu Boonnateekul, who told a newspaper on February 6, 1958, that the confession was voluntary and that "there was no threat made against him." The officer added that the interpreter had simply told Si Quey to say everything he wanted to say.
Others have questioned the circumstances. Barry Kenyon, writing in the Pattaya Mail, says Si Quey did not speak Thai and "was allegedly promised he could return to China if he confessed." The Bangkok Post, in an opinion piece in July 2020, asked whether a migrant laborer who could neither speak nor read Thai was "afforded due process," and noted that his conviction rested on his own statements and not on scientific evidence. It also reported that he changed his account once.
The trial opened in Bangkok on March 25, 1958, and lasted nine days, according to Khaosod English and The Standard. Both say he pleaded guilty. Khaosod English writes that he pleaded guilty to every count and discussed his actions in court. MGR Online says he pleaded guilty to all seven cases, the Rayong case and the six earlier ones, when taken before the court, and that police had no evidence tying him to the first six apart from his own statements. The Standard says he pleaded guilty to all charges.
The Pattaya Mail gives a narrower account. Kenyon writes that Si Quey was convicted of murdering one eight-year-old boy near Rayong, that he admitted six other child killings in different provinces, and that "he was convicted only of the Rayong killing." The Bangkok Post opinion piece likewise says he was convicted of murdering a boy, and says he was accused in connection with six children across four provinces between 1954 and 1958. The Bangkok Post's own profile says he was found guilty of murdering six children, and its report on the planned cremation says seven.
The accounts differ, and the Rayong killing is the one on which they agree.
On sentencing, Khaosod English says the trial court first sentenced him to life imprisonment because he had pleaded guilty. The Standard says the trial court imposed a death sentence and reduced it to life because he had confessed. MGR Online says the reduction to life was an act of leniency. The prosecution appealed, arguing, in Khaosod English's account, that the evidence was strong enough to convict him regardless of the plea. The appeals court imposed a sentence of death. The Thai Post, in 2020, attributes the death sentence to the Supreme Court and does not mention a lower court.
Si Quey was held at Bang Kwang prison in Bangkok. Khaosod English reports that the death warrant was signed by Field Marshal Sarit Thanarat, who led the military government, and the Pattaya Mail likewise says the execution was carried out on Sarit's orders. He was executed in September 1959. The reports disagree on the day. The Bangkok Post, in two reports, and the Thai Post give September 16, 1959; Khaosod English and The Standard give September 17, 1959. MGR Online gives September 16, 1958, a year earlier, a date at odds with every other account and with the trial dates it gives itself.
The public debate about the case has run for years and rests on a few arguments.
Khaosod English lists the doubts in its feature: Si Quey spoke little Thai and communicated through an interpreter; forensic science was almost nonexistent; skeptics asked whether a poor, lone migrant could have traveled across four provinces to commit the crimes; Thai police had a history of blaming scapegoats under pressure in high-profile cases; and the arrest and quick execution took place during the Cold War, when the military government was hostile to China and suspicious of the Chinese community. The same article says Sarit ordered the summary execution of many suspected criminals.
Wasana Wongsurawat, a historian at Chulalongkorn University, told the South China Morning Post in 2019 that "the legal system failed him" and that he "was denied due process." The newspaper says she believes he was likely a scapegoat for some or all of the killings, and she ties the case to anti-communist feeling, when Chinese immigrants were suspected of being revolutionaries.
Kenyon, in the Pattaya Mail, writes that "to say that Si Quey was convicted on doubtful grounds would be an understatement." He gives as reasons that the conviction rested on his own admission in court, that police were under pressure to solve several child killings, and that other suspects have been proposed. He concludes that whether Si Quey was a child killer, or whether "the system which engulfed him is an historical unknown." That is Kenyon's argument, not a finding by any court or official.
Residents of Thap Sakae, where he had lived, hold a view that predates the recent debate. The Standard quotes two of them, a retired police lieutenant and a local woman, who said they believed Si Quey was a good man who did not commit the crimes. The newspaper notes that their belief rested on accounts passed down locally and not on evidence. The lieutenant said he accepted the justice process of the time, and the woman said she could not produce evidence to refute the records.
His body was cremated on July 23, 2020, in Nonthaburi province, after the museum withdrew it from display.
The Bangkok Post reports that the cremation was requested by residents of Thap Sakae, by people online and by the National Human Rights Commission. Khaosod English quotes Naras Savestanan, head of the Corrections Department, as saying that the cremation was a "gesture of his exoneration," and the outlet says new evidence suggested Si Quey "was most likely innocent." The Standard reports that the National Human Rights Commission noted that his legal status remained that of an executed prisoner. No court has been reported to have reopened the case. Coconuts and The Standard report that residents of Thap Sakae and campaigners attended.
At the cremation, Coconuts quotes the human rights activist Angkhana Neelapaijit as saying "justice was done today." An 83-year-old former neighbor said she was certain he was innocent and had prayed for him to go to heaven. The Standard adds that the actor who played Si Quey in a screen adaptation was among those present.
Three points remain open.
The first is scope. The Pattaya Mail and the Bangkok Post opinion piece say one conviction, for the Rayong killing, with six other child killings admitted or accused. Khaosod English, MGR Online and The Standard say he pleaded guilty to every count. No judgment text is on the public record.
The second is the number of children. Outlets variously say five, six or seven, and the figures depend on whether the Rayong case is counted among them.
The third is the execution date, September 16 or 17, 1959.
Whatever the courts decided on the earlier cases, the later debate has concentrated on the same questions: the interpreter, the weight placed on a confession, and the climate of 1958. The Thai film and television adaptations mentioned by The Standard helped keep the name in circulation, and the long-running use of his name to frighten children is described by the South China Morning Post.
1927 (or about 1921): Born in or near Shantou, China, according to different outlets.
December 28, 1946: Arrives in Bangkok on a cargo ship (Khaosod English).
1954 to 1957: Child killings in Prachuap Khiri Khan, Bangkok and Nakhon Pathom later attributed to him in the police case.
January 1958: Arrested in Rayong province after the death of eight-year-old Somboon Boonyakan.
February 6, 1958: Rayong police commander tells a newspaper the confession was voluntary.
March 25, 1958: Trial opens; he pleads guilty. It lasts nine days.
1958 to 1959: Trial court imposes life; the appeals court imposes a death sentence.
September 16 or 17, 1959: Executed at Bang Kwang prison.
July 23, 2020: Cremated in Nonthaburi province after the museum withdrew the display.