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How Not To Act At The Airport

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  • How Not To Act At The Airport

    Briton faces up to two years in Thai jail after 'passport mix-up'

    Kickboxer charged with insulting immigration officials claims UK embassy wrongly branded travel document false

    * Ian MacKinnon and Andrew Drummond in Bangkok
    * guardian.co.uk, Monday 9 March 2009 12.18 GMT


    A British man holidaying in Thailand claimed he was beaten, handcuffed and jailed after Foreign Office diplomats mistakenly told Phuket immigration officials he was travelling on a false passport.

    Simon Burrowes, 44, also claimed that officials from the British embassy in Bangkok acknowledged their error only after he had spent 11 days in a cramped cell with 126 inmates.

    Burrowes, from Wembley, north London, has been barred from leaving Thailand and is on £2,000 bail after being charged with insulting the immigration officials during the initial altercation over the passport.

    The 6ft 3ins Thai kick-boxing instructor admits he lost his temper as his flight left without him. But he must wait until the end of next month to appear in court and could face up to two years in jail.

    The nearest the embassy has come to apologising was a remark by the consular official in Phuket whom, he claims, said: "I can empathise with your self-righteousness. It was a one-in-a-thousand glitch."

    Burrowes was ending a three-week working holiday as trainer to British kick-boxing champion, Michael Nagle, when he went to the airport to catch his flight home on a Friday and was arrested.

    "Thai immigration officials were suspicious of my passport," said Burrowes. "When they checked with the British embassy, an official told them my passport number didn't exist.

    "I spoke to the embassy official. He said it didn't exist. I begged him to double check. But he refused because the embassy closed at Friday midday. They said they'd prioritise the matter the following week, so I was sent to jail. Officials had all day in London to check. I can't believe they couldn't have done it."

    Burrowes, whose parents are from Guyana, says he was treated like a drugs' smuggler and taken to jail because he did not have the £2,000 bail the authorities demanded.

    "From that moment on I was treated as someone less than human," he said. "I was handcuffed to another Thai and sent to court. As I was led into the court I was beaten by an official with a leather strap."

    Four days later the British consular official visited him in jail. It was a week later that embassy officials visited again, told him his passport had been verified as genuine seven days earlier.

    The officials then told him he was being detained on a charge that he was "rude and aggressive" to the Thai immigration controllers, which was the first he knew of it.

    Burrowes, concedes he used the words "fucking" and "idiot" in front of immigration officials when his flight, for which his ticket was non-refundable, left without him.

    "They'd kept me waiting an hour studying my passport with a magnifying glass," he said. "I was angry. I grabbed my passport and walked out of the immigration area, saying, 'I'm a British citizen who has come to your country to spend my money. Don't treat me like a fucking idiot."

    Thai immigration police say it was they who were called "fucking idiots". His case could take a year, longer if he pleads not guilty, and the first hearing is not until 27 April.

    A spokesman for the Bangkok embassy could not discuss the details of the case, but said no officials had at any time told anyone involved that the passport was not valid. Nor had any official admitted "glitches" or "empathised" with Burrowes.

    "We proceeded to check the validity of the passport immediately on being informed by the police of his arrest on Friday," he said. "The diplomatic mission that issued the passport replied to confirm the passport the following Tuesday and we informed the police who dropped the charges."

  • #2
    The Embassy in Thailand is probably the most uncaring and inefficient example of ineptitude on the planet.

    These imbeciles couldn't make a cup of coffee without intervention from a Home Office official!

    A collection of bumbling jobsworths who wouldn't normally qualify to clean windows in the UK.

    It's been this way since at least as long as I have been here and was brought painfully to light during their incredibly stupid and dangerous handling of the tsunami crisis.

    Comment


    • #3
      So the British Government's overhaul of the passport system to help prevent terrorism is obviously working really well.

      4 days to check the validity of a passport!!!!!!!!! It should take 4 bloody minutes!


      I can't wait to see how long it takes with a 'biometric passport' 4 months..... 4 years?


      RR.
      Pedants rule, OK. Or more precisely, exhibit certain of the conventional trappings of leadership.

      "I love the smell of ladyboy in the morning."
      Kahuna

      Comment


      • #4
        Perfect example how states treat their citizens nowadays.

        This is a shame.

        Someone is sent to a thai jail and "offices close at 5"... I hope these "officials" will get the crap beaten out of them.

        Germany treats its citizens similarly bad.
        I hold a german passport and I am just a number to them.

        I also have a french passport, and they treat their people well.
        If all doesn't always work out as hoped, at least they try.


        The Swiss embassy in Thailand really broke all records when after the Tsunami, they cut the phone lines off because too many were calling !!!

        I hope Mr. Burrowes will be awarded at least 100k pounds of damages.

        I would like that the "foreign office officials" be responsible on their private funds for that fuck up.

        Comment


        • #5
          OK the guy fucked up initially, as the passport appeared dodgy and he should have kept his temper. He has since been playing the race card in the UK papers 'they only stopped me coz.........' stupid comment to make. Any immigration officer at any immigration office in the world has the right to query a passport he considers to be dodgy. My old one had been damaged and I got a telling off one day for the state of it.
          The performance of the embassy was totally pathetic however. Instad of swilling pink gins and working a 4 day week these people are there at our sufferance and failed him miserably. Why is there no duty officer at the embassy available to handle queries 24 hours a day and why did they not get the guy's details so they could cross check him after the initial check on the passport number failed. Date of birth, where passport was issued, and name etc are just basics that could have been run. In Phuket there is an honouary consul who has very little powers so Imm should have dealt direct with the emabssy in Bangkok. Opps I forgot- it was Friday afternoon so everyone had knocked off for the weekend. Wast of taxpayer's money the lot of them. Other embasies do road trips to Phuket to help out their nationasl with visa issues, passports, etc- these cnuts just sit on their arses in bangkok.

          Saying that though when i lost my passport last year the consulate in Chiang Mai was very efficient and there's 2 gorgeous ladies working there
          I couldn't give a shit how long it is until you're next holiday- I live here

          Comment


          • #6
            A British tourist told today how he spent 21 days in jail in Thailand after a €˜one in a 1000€™ passport error by British Embassy officials.

            Simon Burrowes, 44, was stopped as he tried to board a holiday flight back home to London because Thai police suspected his passport was forged.

            He insisted it was genuine but when police called the embassy in Bangkok to check, officials there could find no record of it.

            Mr Burrowes was charged with travelling on false papers, then charged with insulting Thai immigration officers after he lost his temper and swore.

            He was thrown into a squalid cell with 120 other prisoners and only a 4ft x 2ft space to sleep.

            Embassy staff told him that as it was Friday and they shut at midday, he would have to wait until the next week for more help.

            They finally confirmed the following Tuesday that the passport, which had been issued at a British consulate in Australia, was genuine €“ by which time the Thai authorities had decided to press on with the case against him for insulting immigration officials.

            He was unable to raise £2,000 bail and spent 21 days in a Bangkok jail before being released pending trial.

            Embassy staff later blamed a 'one in a 1000 glitch€™ for failing to verify his passport immediately, Mr Burrowes said.

            He claimed he did not call the Thai officials €˜f***ing idiots€™ but had instead accused them of treating him like a €˜f***ing idiot'.

            Mr Burrowes, a martial arts expert who went to Thailand to study kick boxing, said he was beaten and shackled.

            He said he had lost his flat in Wembley because he could not pay the rent while awaiting trial in Bangkok and would have to pay for another flight home as his ticket had been non-refundable.

            'I told the British Embassy on the police phone at the airport that my passport was legal and I had been using it for nine years,' he said.

            'The official said he could not find any record of it. The number was not on their computers. I begged him to double check but he refused. He said the Embassy closed at Friday midday for their long weekend.

            'From that moment on I was treated as someone less than human. I was handcuffed to another Thai and sent to court. I was beaten by an official with a leather strap.

            'Then they sent me to jail because I did not have the £2,000 they demanded for bail.

            'The next week one of the British officials said: €˜I can empathise with your self-righteousness€™ and that it was one of the one in a thousand glitch cases. '

            A British Embassy spokesman said of the incident: 'The validity of Mr Burrowes€™ passport was resolved within three working days.

            'We then informed the police and they dropped that charge. The subsequent period of detention and court proceedings relate to a different charge.'

            'In jail the only people treated worse than me were the Burmese, who were made to do all the cleaning,' Mr Burrowes said.
            Three working days? What exceptional arrogance these cunts in that office have.

            Comment


            • #7
              That is a very scary story indeed.   Sadly it could happen to anyone from any country at anytime but your chances of hitting the Thai lottery are probably better
              You Live and You Learn -- Hopefully!

              Comment


              • #8
                yeah 3 'working' so that means a week- pompous arses.
                I couldn't give a shit how long it is until you're next holiday- I live here

                Comment


                • #9
                  and, come to think of it...

                  one in a thousand is a very high probability for such fuckups!

                  one in a thousand... that means for every 4 airplanes from UK, there is such a mistake???


                  P.S.
                  for my part, that wouldn't be such a bad scenario after all... if they put me in prison together with some ladyboys caught stealing !!
                  Then I'd get out and sue their civil servant asses through hell and back!!

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