The Phone Call

0:00Support for Criminal comes from Noturium. Noturium believes skin care should be clinically effective, skin-compatible, and affordable. They help you make it easy to find the ingredients, products, and routines that are right for you. A few people on our team have tried their vitamin C serum and said they really liked it, and they like the affordable price point. Give your skin the affordable, luxurious glow it deserves. Go to naturium.com slash criminal for 10 % off your first purchase today. That's naturium.com slash criminal. Bloomington, Indiana's always been a town of lifelong learners. Lectures that run long.

0:37Dinner table debates that run longer. We're always studying something. But this year, the syllabus changed. We learned about blitzes and blocks, pick sixes and play action, and what the inside of that outside stadium looks like on a sunny Saturday afternoon. We may not always understand the whole thing, but man, if it isn't fun to learn. Visit Bloomington. Learn something new.

1:04This episode contains references to suicidal ideation. Please use discretion. How long had you lived in San Francisco? I moved here July 2022. This is Beau Suprasert. It was one of my dream cities to live in. I was in Seattle before and had a few opportunities to come down to San Francisco and fell in love with it. Bo says that on one visit to San Francisco, she went to Land's End, a park with a view of the water. And she says it was so beautiful that she promised herself she would move there one day. And she did. She got a job there as a data analyst working in health care. And I'm just glad that this opportunity came up for me to move for work.

1:56And yeah, I just really started the career that I really enjoy and felt like I'm growing and learning. And yeah, life was good. Bo moved to the U.S. 11 years ago. She came from Thailand to go to school when she was 18. I wanted to study psychology and thought that the U.S. is one of the best places to do that. And then I was going to move back. But then I guess life never really turned out the way you planned it. And I kind of just stick around. And the next thing I know, I'm here 10 plus years now. And would you go back to Thailand often to visit? I haven't really gone back that often. Once every few years.

2:46But my family do come for visits. So we do take turns and I do get to see them. It was during the pandemic, though, that was really tough that we didn't get to see shadow quite often and everything was just kind of put on pause. At the beginning of 2024, right after New Year's, Bo started to plan a trip back. Her passport was about to expire, so she was going to renew it while she was in Thailand. But her passport was so close to expiring that she got a little worried. She got in touch with the Thai consulate in L.A. They told her she was fined to travel on her passport and that she could renew her passport once she got to Thailand.

3:30So Bo flew to Bangkok in February of 2024. I was only back there for two weeks, and the first week was getting the paperwork done. So it wasn't, you know, the most relaxed vacation and whatnot. But the other half, I did get to spend some time with my family. We went to Ayutthaya, which is our old capital nearby. I grew up in Bangkok, so it was just an hour, an hour and a half drive. And that was really fun. I get to wear the Thai traditional clothes. We took pictures and get to eat all the good food. That's probably my family's love language. With Thai, you're back. You get fed with a lot of delicious food.

4:15It was a good trip. It was. Whenever you would go back to Thailand, were you kind of split? I mean, you loved San Francisco, but did you kind of think, maybe I should be living back at home? No, that actually never really crossed my mind. I liked it here so much, and I like my independency here. Yeah, never really crossed my mind that I would move back. One day, about three weeks after she got back to San Francisco, she received a phone call. I was at work in my office, and I remember exactly it was 2, 3 p.m. on a Friday afternoon. The woman on the other end of the line said she was calling from the Thai Embassy in Washington, D.C.

5:02And then she told Bo about a man who had just been detained while trying to enter Thailand. She said that guy had eight passports in his position, and he was trying to enter Thailand from L.A. And he got caught at the Suwana Pum Airport, which is the main airport in Bangkok. And one of the passports was under my name.

5:33The woman from the embassy told Bo the name of the man who was being investigated and asked if Bo knew him. Bo answered no. She asked me if I lost my passport or if anyone had access to it at all and I said no, it's a new passport, it's with me and I'm 100 % sure because it's due in my suitcase. I haven't really unpacked my suitcase at that point. The woman recommended that Bo report it to the police in Thailand. It sounded like it could be a case of identity theft. Bo says she felt a little worried. I left home when I was 18, so I don't actually have an identity in Thailand, if you know what I mean.

6:19In a sense, I don't really have a bank account. or I did when I was younger and I closed it the second time I went back or something when I was still in college. I don't have a lot of paperwork in Thailand anymore. All the government knows about me is my passport and my Thai ID. I never own any property. Nothing is under my name. So in my head, it makes sense if anyone wanted to, you know, just take my identity because I do exist. But the fact that I'm not active, a citizen of Thailand, I thought it is possible. The woman on the phone told her she was transferring her to the Thai police. where Bo spoke with a police officer who introduced himself as Captain Supakhan Tipula and said he worked at the Central Investigation Bureau, or CIB, in Thailand, an agency which handles major criminal investigations.

7:27Bo told him everything she'd just learned and said she'd like to report a case of identity theft. The officer began filing a report for her. He asked her for her Thai identification number. He said he needed to look her up in their system to verify some information. And then Beau says she heard someone in the background say her name and ID number. And next... She can be very dangerous. Proceed with caution. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal.

8:06The police officer started asking Bo a lot of questions. He told her she was a suspect in a criminal case. Bo was confused. I mean, you talked to the police officer because you thought you were filing a report about identity theft. And then he says you're a suspect. That must have been shocking. Very. to my core. She was told that a group of people had been arrested in Thailand for running an international money laundering scheme. Four Thai nationals and one U.S. citizen. And the police said they knew that Bo, or someone using Bo's information, had opened various bank accounts to help the group move money around.

8:49Bo tried to explain to the officer that someone must have stolen her identity. She was just calling about a passport. She explained to him that she'd spent very little time in Thailand over the past ten years, and that maybe criminals could have been using her identity without her knowing it. The officer sent her the names and photos of the five people who had been arrested, and wanted to know if Bo knew any of them. One of them was a man who worked at a Thai consulate in the U.S. Beau says her head was spinning. But when she heard about the consulate employee, she felt like she began to understand what might have happened.

9:34She thought about how she had sent a message to the Thai consulate just a few months ago to ask if she could still travel on a passport that was about to expire. This consulate employee could have seen her message and realized that she was an ideal target for identity theft. and he would have had access to her new passport information. Beau explained all of this to Officer Tipula. He said the police were looking at all the possibilities. But he also made it clear that she was still a suspect and that if she wanted to get her name off the suspect list, she would need to prove her innocence.

10:18We'll be right back. To listen without ads, join Criminal Plus.

10:51Transcription by CastingWords for three months,$90 for six months, or$180 for 12-month plan required,$15 per month equivalent, taxes and fees extra. Initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy. See terms. Running a business shouldn't feel like surviving a software group project. One app for accounting, another for inventory, another for sales, and somehow none of them talk to each other. That's where Odo comes in, an all-in-one business management software that brings every part of your business together. From sales and accounting to inventory and marketing, all-in-one powerful platform.

11:20No messy integrations, no bouncing between tabs, and best of all, no spreadsheets. Stop managing software and start managing your business with one unified system. Try for free today at odoo.com slash vox. That's odoo.com slash vox.

11:39Officer Tipula told Beau that while they continued their investigation into the money laundering scheme, she was free to continue her daily life. But she needed to be in frequent touch, so the police knew she wasn't planning to run away. The officer told Bo that she would need to send the police several daily updates about her whereabouts. Four times a day, at 9, 12, noon, 5 p.m., and 8 p.m., with a short description. They asked me to write down my name, the time, and then what I was doing at that time. they said that this is the normal procedure that they use when someone is under an investigation.

12:27If she didn't cooperate with the investigation, she was told she could be arrested and sent back to Thailand. And I would be put in like a jail or detention center in Thailand waiting for the court date, and who knows how long that might be. Then I could be there in jail or detention center for over a year. The justice system is not perfect here or there, right? People do go to jail for the wrong reason, even for a crime they didn't commit. And I cried myself to bed that night and was like, I don't want to be put in jail. I'm just so scared. Bo did as the officer told her. She sent updates four times a day, and she also spoke with Officer Tipula every day.

13:20The officer said he had undercover agents keeping an eye on Bo to make sure she didn't try to interfere with the investigation or escape. She thought that her phone might be tapped. A week passed. I started to get scared and paranoia because they kept saying that, you know, there are people watching me. I started to look around and see who was looking at me. And then in my head, I started making these stories that, oh, that person who crossed the street, they look suspicious. Oh, everyone looks so suspicious. And you were still going to work and trying to make it seem normal. Yeah. That's what they instructed me to do, to seem normal.

14:14Continue living your life, continue going to work. But just know that if, you know, one wrong move, you can be taken away. Officer Tipula told her not to tell anyone about what was going on because this was a high-stakes international investigation. He said the Central Investigation Bureau in Thailand was working with the FBI to solve it. I should be very careful about telling anyone because it's a matter of national security. Bo wanted to prove her innocence. And she says she also wanted to help the police catch the people who had put her in this situation. She had learned from Officer Tipula that the Thai consulate officer had been arrested, along with a U.S.

15:04police officer who was suspected of helping the crime syndicate, and two Thai bank managers, and an exchange student. You know, I stay up late and trying to connect all the dots. Beau says she was having trouble sleeping. Weeks went by. She kept sending updates to the police four times a day, reporting where she was and what she was doing, talking on the phone with Officer Tipila, sometimes for several hours. I would be going for a run, and I would just be super hyper-vigilant about who's running after me, who's running ahead of me. I was really trying to figure it out. And then one day, Officer Tipula called Bo with news.

15:56One of the suspects in the money laundering scheme had confessed that Bo had been working with them. The criminal accused me that I sold my passport to them so that they can use to, like, you know, open bank account or whatever. and in return I would get 5-10 % of their profit. Bo said that didn't make any sense. She had a good job in the U.S. She had no reason to commit a serious crime, just to make a little extra money. She said she could send over her bank statement, but the officer explained that with this kind of investigation involving large amounts of money, it wasn't that simple. They would need to work with experts.

16:43They are in contact with the FBI here in the U.S. because this is a multinational money laundering case that they're trying to solve. And they would create a bank account for me so that I can deposit my money into that bank account so that they can do the investigation that all of the money that I made here It was, you know, legit, legal. So that would be my evidence at the court that I'm innocent. Bo says she was told that the FBI would set up the account for her through her own bank. She went to look for it. That bank account appeared on my, you know, phone on my online banking app. It was there.

17:36But there was a change of plans. Bo was told that instead of moving her money into this new account She'd need to wire the money to a bank account in Hong Kong Where experts in money laundering would hold it while the case was being investigated She was told she would get her money back once the investigation was over When they first mentioned that you were going to have to wire money What did you think?

18:05I I believed him. I really thought that that was the procedure, that I can just prove that I'm innocent. Bo says at this point she was sleep-deprived, stressed, and anxious after feeling like she was being followed, reporting her whereabouts, and talking to the police every day. She didn't see this as a red flag. I think that thought that I really want to prove that I have nothing to do with the crime that they've been accusing me of, was very strong, that I needed to protect myself and my identity and my reputation. I came all the way here, you know, been living by myself 10 plus years, and I wasn't willing for anyone or anything to take that away from me.

19:09Bo didn't know it was a scam. She did as they instructed. They told me to go to the bank and just made up a story. if the bank asks where or whom I'm wiring the money to. And they made me, you know, be on the phone call with them. As she walked into the bank, she had her AirPods in. She says her long hair covered them, so they weren't noticeable. So they're, like, in my ear, and they can hear everything I said to the bank teller. So you were on the phone with them secretly while you were at the bank? Yeah. What were they saying? They didn't say anything. But the fact that they made me feel like they are monitoring me.

20:05I think that was the tactic they used to have control over me and my thoughts. Bo wired them$81 ,000. Pretty much everything I had. In a study published in the British Journal of Criminology, researchers found that the tactics scammers use are often very similar to other types of coercive control. For example, domestic violence cases. The scammers establish a relationship with their victim, groom them over time, and manipulate them into believing in a, quote, exploitative reality. One police sergeant who led a task force investigating scams in Canada said that at one point, he wondered if the scammers he was investigating could somehow be working with psychologists, because they seem so good at getting people to believe their stories.

21:06Once an officer stopped a money transfer that someone had made to scammers, but the scam victim didn't believe them when they tried to explain that the whole thing was fake. The police sergeant said, it's a form of hypnosis. At one point, Bo actually received a text message from the Thai consulate in L.A., warning people that scammers were posing as Thai police. Bo says that she discussed this with Officer Tipila, and his explanation made sense to her, that the crime syndicate had moles within at least one Thai consulate in the U.S., so they could have sent her this text to try and dissuade her from working with the police.

21:52You know, it's like, it's a whole story that they fed me, and in my head, I kept making, you know, connecting the dot by myself, and that's how I felt so hard for this story, and I just believed in it so much that it felt like a cult, that I couldn't see otherwise. I couldn't believe otherwise. She says her mind was so fixated on this investigation that she started noticing weird little things that seemed to confirm that she was under surveillance by the authorities. While she was at work, she noticed a Wi-Fi network that would sometimes pop up on her computer, named FBI. Today, she says someone probably just called it that as a joke.

22:45But back then, it felt strange and scary to see that name on her computer in her office building. Now looking back, a lot of it is, you know, when you're so deep into some conspiracy theory or something, it's spiral. And it's hard to get out. and you see things you would not normally see. I think I was just very consumed by this thought that I'm a part of this big case. I knew I'm innocent and that I can get myself out of it, but part of me also wanted to really help them solve the case.

23:33As the weeks and months passed, Bo was getting more and more anxious, and she couldn't talk to anyone about what was going on. The scammers had told her not to, and she was afraid of implicating others. But she decided she had to talk to a friend in case something happened to her. She asked one of her close friends to come over to her house. When he arrived, Bo put her phone in his car so no one could listen in on their conversation, Pulled her friend into the bathroom in her building lobby, closed the door, and told him the story in a whisper. My friend argued with me and trying to shake me and be like, Beau, it's a scam.

24:19I remember that day that I argued with him. And we argued for a while, like over an hour, and I kept telling him that it's not a scam.

24:36We'll be right back.

25:02also comes in a dress and a crop tank. These are made in our buttery soft Nulu fabric. And my favorite part is the built-in bra. It makes it super easy to wear for yoga or honestly, as an everyday basic. You can find Flow Y Styles in store or online at lululemon.com. The Hulu original series, Furious, is coming to Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus July 27. There are three victims we know of. The suspect is female, white, late 20s. Female serial killers. Kill for power. control. I believe there's a deeper motivation here. You have no idea who you're dealing with, and you are going to end up dead. I've been waiting for you.

25:41Watch the Hulu original series, Furious, on July 27th. Streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply. Bo Sue Prossert says that over the next few months, she still went to work, but otherwise rarely left her apartment. She was afraid of being followed. I started having these suicidal thoughts because I felt that the investigation is not going anywhere. And I was tired of having to report myself four times a day and be very super paranoia about everyone and every single interaction that I have. Bo told the people she believed to be police officers that she didn't think she could handle it anymore You know, this it's so overwhelming that I lost my sense of safety couldn't eat, couldn't sleep I didn't want to live that way anymore and they said, don't stop almost there the case is almost over You will have all the evidence, and you will go to the court, and the court will rule you innocent very easily.

27:04Because I've been, you know, providing evidence this whole time that I'm being very corporative and helpful in the whole investigation, and that I will live a normal life again, and that I should not let these criminals win, and I believe them. Bo eventually transferred more money. The scammers kept coming up with new reasons. Bo had to borrow money from her family, primarily from her aunt, who took money out of her retirement account. The fake police officer told her that her family's assets could be frozen and that charges could be brought against them too if they got in the way of the investigation.

27:46He sent Bo photos of her brother and her aunt as proof that they were being surveilled. So Bo told her family that she needed the money to apply for a Ph.D. program. In total, Bo wired over$300 ,000.

28:05About three months after Bo had received that first phone call, the fake police officer told Bo that they had presented all the evidence in court and that Bo had been ruled innocent. She could finally stop sending them daily updates of her location. I'm off the suspect list. I can live my normal life again, and if I want to collect the money, I can go back to Thailand and someone will pick me up. I would go straight to the police station, and I would collect the money. Bo started looking at flights, but she was scared to travel to Thailand. The police officer had made it clear that the money laundering syndicate had killed people who had talked to the police and provided evidence against them.

28:57She called Officer Tipila. Her call didn't go through, so she tried again. She texted him, but got no response. It started to hit me that there's no one else on the other line. And that's when I consulted my friend, the same one that told me it was a scam. And he sat down with me, made me call the FBI. But it was already late. It was closer to midnight at that point. They sat in Bo's friend's car while she tried to call the FBI. The next day, she decided she needed to see them in person. So I walked myself to the FBI office here in San Francisco during my, you know, lunch break. And I submitted my information to the FBI agent.