Dilip Kuner
A BRITISH man wanted for questioning over the gruesome murder and dismemberment of a dancer in Thailand can be extradited from Spain, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has said.
Shane Looker, then 47, was arrested on Ibiza in 2017 after a three year manhunt.
Thai police say he is the last person known to have been in contact with 27-year-old victim Laxami ‘Pook’ Manochat.
She had been cut into pieces before being stuffed inside a suitcase which was weighed down with stones and thrown into the Mae Klong River in Kanchanaburi, 70 kms south of Bangkok
Security camera footage had caught Looker walking hand in hand with Manochat after leaving a bar in Nana Plaza, Bangkok.
A Spanish court ordered his extradition to Thailand in 2018 after it decided that the guarantees offered by Thai authorities were sufficient to ensure that he would not be executed or subjected to inhumane treatment.
But Looker – who admits knowing the victim but denies involvement in her killing – maintained he would not face a fair trial and took his case against extradition to the ECHR.
The ECHR rejected his application ‘for failure to exhaust domestic remedies’ saying he could still have appealed in Spain against the decision to extradite him.
Looker had entered Thailand on October 31 and was last seen with Manochat on November 2, police said.
The suitcase was found in the Mae Klong River on November 9. Initially police could not identify Looker from the video images, but they later received a tip off giving Looker’s full name, nationality and address in the town of Hua Hin.
Officers raided the address, but Looker had disappeared. They found the shorts and shirt he was allegedly wearing in the video. DNA evidence matched samples taken from beneath Manochet’s fingernails.
