Man stabbed in front of his girlfriend while trying to break up a fight
This is the disturbing moment a British tourist was beaten and then stabbed in front of his girlfriend in southern Thailand.
Charlie Faulkner, from Portsmouth, was walking to a 7-11 convenience store with his partner Kate when he saw a gang of locals attacking a foreigner in the city of Phuket.
The incident was captured on CCTV in the notorious red light party strip of Bangla Road in the early hours of Friday.
Footage shows at least five men cornering a man, dressed in a white T-shirt and a pair of white shorts holding several bags with takeaway, into an alleyway.
Caught off guard, the victim raises his arms to defend himself before one of the thugs picks up a plastic chair and launches it towards him.
He can be seen trying to push the men away as they land punch after punch, kick after kick.
Charlie – wearing a black top and shorts – allegedly stepped in to intervene at the entrance of the alley.
It is understood that this was the moment when the thugs stabbed him in the left side of the abdomen, while his partner was also caught up in the fight.
His shaken girlfriend said: ‘We had no idea who those men were. We have never met them before. We were just caught in the incident.’
A convenience store employee said that Charlie entered and collapsed in front of the counter bleeding.
He was reportedly coughing up blood and unable to speak. After removing his T-shirt, they found a small puncture wound, believed to be from a sharpened metal object, on his left rib cage.
A picture shows him laying on the ground in the store while eyewitnesses give him first aid.
The tourist had also been struck on the head with a glass bottle. He was rushed to the Patong Hospital for treatment.
Police Lieutenant Colonel Chanan Mekchai of the Patong Police Station said that emergency services received a report at 4.40 am.
He said: ‘According to security footage, at 4.32 am, a foreigner wearing a white shirt and shorts engaged in a fistfight with a group of Thai men on Soi Bangla.
‘The altercation escalated, and they pushed each other into a small alley, Soi Lao, before taking the fight to the roadside, where they were seen by the British man.’
Police have seen identified the suspects and are currently working to track them all down.
Patong Police said in a police report on May 19 that three of the Thai men – who were not named – had been arrested.
The incident is among the latest cases of violence on British tourists and expats in Thailand.
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