The Tourists That Never Came Home | Murder In paradise | Real Crime

this is the story of an island paradise a paradise with a dark side as much of a beautiful place that it is don't be fooled don't be tricked a story of mysterious deaths and conspiracy theories the way that they straightened us was disgraceful i think that they just try and cover these things up [Music] it was a very scary time when we tried to piece together what had happened [Music] he alleges that he was sexually assaulted abused beaten threatened they can control people coming and going they control money they know when an outsider is coming in and trial by internet [Music] this is the inside story of murder in [Music] paradise [Music] young backpackers [Music] more than half a million travelers come here every year to the beaches it's magical when you first arrive everything is perfect and because the contrast between like the way we're kind of policed in europe and everything's controlled when you arrive in thailand you feel like you can do what you like we didn't do much research into koh town did we no we heard about the trampoline that's one of their favorite places yeah most people had said it was their favorite island in thailand so we've obviously allocated a lot more time to this island yeah and we've we're going to book extra nights here than we first thought because we love it so much coattail might be fun but the friends are mindful of a recent murder i didn't realize that it was actually on this island i knew it was in thailand but i wasn't aware it was coated no i i didn't realize i think i didn't realize we were actually going to the island that happened until we got yeah [Music] [Music] just like the girls hannah witheridge and david miller arrive on kotel looking for adventure hannah is 23 and on a break from a postgraduate degree her family tried to persuade her not to go to thailand but she suddenly books tickets and tells them she's leaving she's in regular touch with her mum who is concerned for her safety david is about to start a scholarship with a mining company he comes from jersey and has a tight group of friends who travel with him around thailand [Music] hannah and david meet by chance because they're staying in the same hotel at around 7pm on september 14th 2014 they drink with friends in a bar on siree beach [Music] just after midnight the group goes in different directions hannah and three of her friends head to another beachfront bar known as the ac bar cctv captures david at a supermarket and chatting in the streets at 2am he joins hannah at some point after 2 15 anna and david leave the bath and walk along the beach they are just meters from the safety of their hotel not long after sunrise local hotel owner montreal [Music] i know whether it is she has been brutally attacked and appears to have been raped 12 meters from hana another body floats in the shallows david miller he has severe head winds [Music] a garden hoe covered in blood is found nearby [Music] news of the murders quickly spreads across the island i was asleep in bed and i got a knock at my door and it was one of my best friends who's a dive instructor here on the island and she came over with the news which wasn't really the story as we know it today and it's kind of a game of you know telephone we didn't know exactly what had happened we had heard these rumors and it was a very uh scary time when we tried to piece together what had happened the police are now at the beach sergeant chad gur is the first officer to arrive um who the thai police open a murder investigation but there are only six officers on the island and they don't get off to a good start they struggle to control the crime scene strangers are wandering across restricted areas bystanders are taking photos of the dead bodies and posting them on social media [Music] the chaotic scenes don't go down well the police's handling of the case threatens to embarrass thailand a senior officer is sent from the police headquarters to direct operations he apologizes to david's family some confidential material that leak out is not really bad especially the portals of the victims on the crime scene and that the trauma nice the the family the victim's family once i have talked to david's father on the phone i said sorry to him despite the problems at the crime scene the police focus on the forensic evidence tests are run on cigarette butts the murder weapon and david and hannah's bodies the results yield a crucial lead officers say they have found the dna profiles of two asian men but the forensic evidence will become one of the most contentious parts of the case the police will soon face allegations of serious misconduct being influenced by the mafia and even torture [Music] the thai island of koh tao is one of southeast asia's most popular destinations for young travelers stunning beaches clear seas a stretch of beachfront bars but this beautiful island is the backdrop to a brutal double murder british backpackers hannah witheridge and david miller are beaten to death after leaving a bar alexandra bax has lived on kotel for six years and writes a blog about the island i couldn't help but be very affected by that story i was hannah a few years ago when i came to koh tao exploring this beautiful country for the first time so i have my heart goes out to that family i can't imagine what they've gone through the thai police believe they have an early lead they say they have found the dna profiles of two asian men from hannah's body officers sweep the island taking swaps from as many asian men as possible the atmosphere is tense there are now more than 60 officers on the island normally there are only six rumors are circulating about powerful local families dubbed by some residents the cotel mafia what we call retired mafia aren't really mafia they're more just families of a lot of control who own the land who own the people and who own what comes on and off of islands that's what makes the island mafia a little bit different from the mainland because they can control people coming and going they control money they know when an outsider is coming in to kind of check up what they're doing maybe one family is consistently linked to the murders on social media the two witchys they own more businesses on siree beach than any other family montreal iit is the first time to see hannah and david's bodies he then appears to play a major role in the police investigation first he is seen in a restricted area as the police gather forensic evidence [Music] a week later confronts a potential witness sean mckenna is friends with david miller montreal and a police officer chased him into a supermarket to ask him about allegations he was seen covered in blood on the night of the murder sean posts to his facebook page thai mafia are trying to kill me sean gives a terrifying account of what he says happens next to a british newspaper before fleeing then they uh they just said to me um it was you to kill them you've got two people's deaths in your arms um [Music] you think they are connected to what happened i think i think they needed escape montreal disagrees he says shawn ran away when he started asking questions let's look at my [Music] he says he had a cut on his body but this occurred before the murders [Music] he says he cooperated with the police and he believes the threat to kill him was genuine [Music] the police are still trying to identify the dna profiles of the two asian men doing most of the jobs in hotels and bars many of them enter the country illegally [Music] andy hall is a migrant rights campaigner he says the burmese are treated poorly by the ties [Music] they're very much unrespected unwelcome and unwanted you know so people take from them what they need in terms of their physical labor their manual labor but they don't give them the rights and they're very high risk of exploitation abuse whether by brokers by their employers or also by corrupt officials thirteen days after the murder andy hall gets reports the police are brutally targeting the burmese so we started to get calls from workers who said they were being tortured or abused as part of the investigation into the case so we sent a team to the island to gather information and we got a lot of information which we consider was reliable and we got photos we got documents to show that people were being abused this is the most serious injury a man claims officers poured boiling hot water on him the police deny all of the accusations [Music] just days after this alleged torture a turning point in the investigation officers identify three burmese migrants spotted on cctv near the crime scene [Music] and weipo [Music] the men admit they were on siree beach on the night of the murder mong mong is released but zorlin and waypio are arrested on immigration and at this stage they are only witnesses in the murder investigation the police say both men had confessed by this point hours before this was filmed waipio claims he was tortured by the police his testicles were pinned he was in a lot of pain he was left naked in a room with lots of police officers photos were taken of him naked he alleges that he was sexually assaulted abused beaten threatened to have his electrocuted to be burnt to be you know thrown into the middle of the ocean or whatever at one point the police translator strokes waypio's head as he struggles to remember what happened also claims he was tortured but the police are confident that they are the killers because of two crucial bits of evidence first they claim the burmese are a perfect match to the dna found at the crime scene and on hannah's body we found inside the body we found a secret there's so many that's enough for us second officers believe they can prove waypio stole david's phone they find this handset at an address linked to the burmese waypio tells officers he found it on the beach the thai police contact the national crime agency in britain they provide the serial number showing it belonged to david the arrests are a coup for the thai police in a show of confidence they stage a the thai police's track record is hardly unblemished especially when investigating the deaths of western tourists [Music] eight months before hannah and david were murdered nick pearson died on the island the pearsons were on a family holiday after a night out on siree beach they returned to their hotel at around 2 a.m nick had had a drink and needed help getting to his room all of us went back together we took nick back to his room because me and my dad had to help him he was limping his knee was really infected from a fall that it had a few days before that my husband saw him to his room and watched him get in bed took his shoes off and his shorts and climbed into bed said good night the next day he was found floating in the bay at the bottom of this hotel he was in the same underwear he had worn to bed and his key was still inside his room an autopsy revealed he had no broken bones suggesting he did not form we thought oh maybe there's a chance that he could have slept walked or something but when you look at the the layout of the resort there's no nobody is going to sleepwalk around around that environment there's steep rocks and steep steps and everything curving around and going around corners and stuff so i mean that that's completely out of the question it must have been about 50 feet down to the water just on a gradient but it was all rocky we walked down to see how maybe he could have fallen into the water but when he got not too far down there was a massive rock so he wouldn't have been able to fall any further because the rock would have stopped him it doesn't make any sense whatsoever to us that he would have walked all the way down to the bottom of the resort and slipped and fell into the ocean and and drowned like that just wouldn't have happened there's no way the police concluded that nick drowned and ruled out foul play but his family thinks he might have been murdered the night before he had been warned off chatting to a young thai woman in this bar the pearsons feel the thai police did not do enough to investigate they say they didn't look in his hotel room or interview any witnesses nick's brother matt lived in thailand for four years he says he loves the country but believes ko tower has no rule of law when you arrive you on by boat kotao all you can see are these beautiful hills green trees blue skies blue ocean beautiful sandy beaches paradise but it seems like that is all a front really for the deeper dark things that are happening which um we've found out the hard way that um the island is obviously run by the mafia the thai police say they did investigate nick's death and deny any allegations of corruption but officers are still under scrutiny as more westerners die on koh tao and the burmese go on trial [Music] just over two weeks after the murders of hannah witheridge and david miller the thai police charged two burmese migrants zorlin and weipio but there are questions about the conduct of officers including allegations of torture the police deny the claims and insist their investigation was carried out properly we are not the best police in the world but we try to do our best we try to bring justice to the victims family the pressure on the police is about to increase human rights campaigner andy hall takes up the case of the burmese he puts together a legal team and goes to koh tao to investigate he meets the alleged killers both in the early 20s when i met them they were in a really bad state to be honest they were shackled 24 hours a day they were kept in a room 24 hours a day on the basis the fact that they were risk of either killing themselves or killing other people zorlin and waipio tell andy hall that they only confess to the crimes after they have been tortured by the police 18 days after their arrest the confessions are withdrawn to hear a first-hand account of these allegations we went undercover in ko samui district [Applause] [Music] prison with only one phone to talk to the men we are reliant upon the translator to accurately relay their comments zorlin describes his alleged experience [Music] or if [Music] [Music] it's not true when they are in our custody we send them to the hospital to make a report the record about their physical bruise then no not even the even the statement or even asking for any doctor so can you tell me 100 that neither zorlin or white foe were tortured yeah sure december 2014 zorlin and wapio are charged with murder and rape the judge adjourns the case until the [Applause] summer as new year breaks more suspicious deaths on hotel frenchman dmitry probs is found hanged in his bungalow the police conclude its suicide that his hands are tied behind his back raising doubts about how he could have killed himself three weeks later british tourist christina annasley is found dead in her hotel room again it's on siree beach again the thai police are criticized [Applause] christina had just started a four-month trip around asia we were starting to get worried and we're sending a text and asking our friends if they heard from her i thought what do we do now and i came home from work and the police had been waiting for us [Music] as soon as they knocked the door maggie just sort of collapsed hysterically christina's father does not know how or why his daughter died on the night of her death she had been taking some medication for a chest infection and had been drinking but her father is frustrated he feels the thai authorities failed to investigate if the combination of medicine and alcohol was sufficient to kill her no toxicology report we can't understand how she could have died the lack of investigation by the thai police the lack of even worrying about about following things through um astounds me [Music] the most glaring issue for her father is that the police did not interview the last man to see his daughter alive at around 6am a man was seen on cctv leaving her room the police knew his identity but failed to contact him so christina's dad tracked him down himself his name was in the thai police report so that further astounds me because they managed to identify him they know he left the island six hours after her death he was due to go so there's nothing suspicious about that there was a time he's due to check out so if they found out his name his nationality where he stayed they would have the address why they couldn't contact him just to eliminate him or to get some information off him to me biggest belief now how we found him was because we had the name it was a simple affair of going on the internet typing his name in he comes up from facebook and uh and there you are and we managed to get a phone number and i actually rang and spoke to him what was it like to pick up the phone to the last person to see your daughter um but a bit emotional um yeah because we probably excuse me we would have um we would have liked to been the last people um but on talking to him he seemed straight quite straightforward the thai police say they only have limited resources on koh tao which is a long way from the mainland the string of deaths do nothing for the island's reputation koh tao is struggling to maintain its image as a holiday paradise but the mayor says many of the tourists who have died are responsible for their own downfall meanwhile [Music] july zorlin and waypio stand trial at the heart of the case is the forensic evidence the prosecution built their argument around the dna samples from hannah's body which are damning evidence against the burmese they claim repeatedly in court that the accused are a 100 match andy hall disagrees you cannot say that so anything is 100 you know dna doesn't work in that way it's very complex and the kind of samples that we're using here we're talking about multiple contributors we're talking about hana we're talking about a test uh a control we're talking about where pure we're talking about sodium we're talking about four dna profiles within one sample the speed at which that was analyzed and the way in which it was presented as a hundred percent certain defies the logic of forensic standards the defense refuses to re-test the samples from hannah's body because they say it was not collected or stored to international standards this point is reinforced in court by their forensic expert doctor palm tip regeneration she claims the police made a number of errors at the crime scene including failing to use [Music] the defense also argues that the police failed to test a number of items from the crime scene including blood on the rocks and sand and hannah's clothes but the crucial issue they say is the murder weapon dr porn tip reveals to the court that she has retested the garden home she says she found dna from david miller and another unknown male who [Music] [Music] that's a big problem when the murder weapon which must be used with such force grips so hard actually doesn't have the dna of the accused on it when they're being tried on a capital murder case that could lead to the execution there needs to be more the defense feels this is a breakthrough but the police insist the forensic evidence is up to scratch i have no idea why people doesn't believe in that evidence we we did it in the laboratory we did it with the specialist the the equipment that they use is a come from european standards things like that comply with iso something i cannot remember [Music] when questioned by us in prison zorlin and waypio cannot explain why their dna could have been found on hannah witherage i [Music] yes or no did you kill hannah ridge and [Music] david [Music] the court adjourns after three months of evidence david miller's family including parents and brother michael return home after attending almost every day the prosecution asked for the death penalty there is no jury rests with three judges district court christmas eve 2015. the mothers of the accused pursuing you and dormer tan are about to enter court their sons are accused of murdering and raping hannah witherage and murdering david miller the prosecution has asked for the death penalty food [Music] [Music] [Music] okay one hour later a guilty verdict and the death penalty the judges are persuaded by the prosecution that the burmese match the dna found on hannah's [Music] the allegations of torture doubts about the murder weapon and questions about the forensic evidence are dismissed [Music] while the burmese families are distraught david miller's family who attended almost the entire trial welcomed the verdict we believe that after a difficult start the royal thai police conducted a methodical and thorough investigation having listened carefully to all the evidence and despite what their lawyers say it is our opinion that the evidence against weipo and zorlin is absolutely overwhelming they've raped to satisfy their selfish desires and murdered to cover up that fact they have shown no remorse during the trial an appeal is planned but drawn in and waypio head to deathworld we are anonymous the battle over their conviction moves from the courtroom to the computer screen it has come to our attention that a thai court in thailand has recently sentenced two burmese migrants to be executed the online activist anonymous champions their cause they hack and crash the thai police website and then release a controversial video accusing the police of framings thai police have accused innocent people before and would rather blame foreigners or migrants for such crimes so as to protect their tourism industry the film received support from an unlikely source [Music] the sister of hannah witheridge laura witherage writes a furious message on facebook attacking thailand and endorsing the video [Music] many thais hate westerners and they have little to no regard for human life [Music] the trial stirs uncomfortable memories for some families they warn parents should stop their children even thinking of going to koh town i don't tell them to do anything in their power to stop them going it's dangerous in view of what's happened to david miller and hannah witheridge and various other people that i've read about it just all leads to the same thing and their parents must be going through hell just like we are and we have been for the last almost two years it doesn't ever go away [Music] i've got no desire to go there at all and the only desire i'd have would be to go and see the last place her daughter was in and then i'd never want to go back there again [Music] hotel january 2016. two weeks after the conviction of zorlin and waipio the police are called to a bar on siri beach a 26 year old british man is found dead the thai police say luke miller died after jumping into a swimming pool and banging his head his family expresses concerns about the investigation luke miller is the sixth westerner in just over two years to die in suspicious circumstances

Channel: Real Crime

Views: 68,177

Keywords: British backpackers, Real Crime, crime scene evidence, crime scene examination, crime scene forensics, crime scene reconstruction, crime victims, crime-solving techniques, criminal behavior analysis, criminal case updates, criminal motive analysis, dangerous tourist spots, exploring criminal intent, in-depth crime analysis, justice for victims, justice served, murder suspects, mystery crime series, solving cold cases, the dark side of paradise, vacation horror stories

Id: ER_hbyXhsW4

Length: 46min 8sec (2768 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 01 2021