BANGKOK, Thailand – A 26-year-old former Thai Army private died outside Mueang Rayong police station shortly after midnight on 5 October after grabbing a patrol officer’s service pistol and using it on himself, police said.

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The man, identified only as Eknarin, was from Roi Et province and had served as an infantry private. The incident occurred on the pavement outside the station in Tha Pradu, Mueang Rayong district. Police Captain Sucheth Thepcharee, deputy inspector for investigations, was alerted at 12.30am and called in senior officers, investigators, Rayong forensic staff, a forensic doctor from Rayong Hospital and rescuers from the Sawang Phon Kuson Rayong Foundation.

Police said Eknarin arrived by motorcycle around 10pm on 4 October, asked to charge his phone and sat at a stone table outside, writing several messages. About 12.30am, a patrol officer approached the same table for duties involving the station’s red-box logbook; police said Eknarin walked behind him, seized his 9mm handgun and died at the scene. The pistol, belonging to the Mueang Rayong patrol officer, was found nearby, and officers photographed the scene and gathered evidence.

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A search of Eknarin’s shoulder bag uncovered a notebook with several pages written as a farewell letter, police said. Part of it stated he had tried to kill himself by jumping into the water in Sattahip district on 4 October but failed, and that someone was trying to kill him, with a request that his body be cremated immediately. The body was sent to Rayong Hospital for a post-mortem, and relatives have been contacted ahead of religious rites.