BANGKOK (AFP) — A Thai court on Saturday granted a police request to extend by at least 12 days the detention of a Canadian schoolteacher accused of sexually abusing boys across Southeast Asia, a police official said.
Christopher Paul Neil was arrested Friday in Thailand after Interpol launched a rare global hunt for the man seen in 200 Internet photos showing him abusing a dozen young Asian boys.
Neil spent the first night in detention at Bangkok's Crime Suppression Bureau under a suicide watch, and was transferred Saturday to Bangkok Remand Prison where he will be held.
"He was restless. He was charged with committing crimes against juveniles, which can impose strong penalties if found guilty," Police Lieutenant General Wimon Pao-In told AFP.
Neil, 32, could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted over accusations that he abused a nine-year-old Thai boy in Bangkok four years ago, police said.
Police questioned the boy late Friday, and Wimon said the boy, now 13 years old, identified Neil several times.
"We have enough evidence to take legal action against him. The evidence is clear and thorough," the police official said.
Wimon said it would take Thai police about 30 days to submit necessary documents to a court to open a trial against the suspected paedophile.
Local TV footage showed Saturday Neil, who wore a red and white stripe T-shirt, white pants and a baseball cap, being fingerprinted.
As on Friday when he was led in handcuffs past dozens of waiting reporters and into the Thai national police headquarters, Neil wore dark sunglasses.
Police said Neil continued to remain silent when asked about the sex abuse allegations.
"When police asked him questions involving the case, the suspect said he did not want to answer the questions," Wimon said, adding that a Thai lawyer, translators and social workers were assisting Neil.
The worldwide search for the Canadian began 10 days ago with a groundbreaking appeal from Interpol for the public's help in tracking him down.
His face had been digitally obscured into a swirl shape but German computer experts reconstructed the images which Interpol then posted on its website along with a public appeal for information.
The operation was codenamed "Vico" because the images were believed to have been taken in Vietnam and Cambodia in 2002 or 2003.
More than 300 people replied to Interpol's appeal, with five people on three continents offering critical information, the agency said in a statement on its website.
Canada has a law that allows its authorities to prosecute nationals accused of sexually exploiting children overseas.
But Canadian justice ministry spokesman Christian Girouard told AFP that he could not comment on whether Canada could make an extradition request for Neil because charges against him had not been filed in Canada.
An official from the Canadian embassy in Bangkok could not be reached for comment Saturday.
Neil was found in a one-storey rental house in Nakhon Ratchasima, around 300 kilometres (200 miles) northeast of Bangkok, where he was with a 25-year-old Thai transvestite, police said.
Police gave no details about his relationship with his companion.
Neil flew to Bangkok from South Korea on October 11, when security cameras documented his arrival at the airport.
He has visited Thailand six times since 2000, and in 2003 had tried and failed to get a job teaching at an international school in Bangkok, according to Thai officials.
Interpol says Neil is from suburban Vancouver, where Canadian media reported that his mother and a sibling live.
Neil once studied at a seminary, hoping to become a priest, but was eventually shunned by his teachers, who felt he lacked the moral backbone for the task, according to reports.
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