Over the last 19 years, a soft-spoken pop music fan and his machine-gun have ended the lives of 55 condemned men and women in Bang Kwang prison; he’s glad it’s over
With a body count of 55 kills, a number matching his age, Chaovarej Jaruboon belies the stereotypical image of a cold, hardened executioner. Indeed, the affable, soft-spoken prison guard could easily be mistaken for a lounge entertainer, as he leans back in his office chair with his acoustic guitar and twangs a few bars of "Jailhouse Rock".
"I love all kinds of music," he says with a wide grin, listing a who’s who of 1950s and 1960s greats: "Andy Williams, Paul Anka, Cliff Richards, Elvis Presley."
It’s hard to imagine he was for many years Thailand’s official trigger man. But then, Chaovarej sees himself as just having done his duty at the very end of his country’s legal process.
A week ago yesterday, on October 19, it became official – Chaovarej became the country’s last firing-squad executioner at Bang Kwang maximum-security prison, just north of Bangkok.
Following mounting pressure from human-rights groups, the government this summer decided to switch from machine-gun executions – denounced as brutal by opponents of capital punishment and others – to death by lethal injection, a method that allows the condemned to die "in peace with no pain or suffering", according to the prison’s new deputy director, Natthee Jitsawang.
The move will leave Chaovarej with another job – arranging the transfer of foreign prisoners to jails in their home countries, once they’ve served mandatory terms in Bang Kwang, otherwise known as the "Bangkok Hilton".
"Now I am happy to retire. Less stress," he says. "I executed many people. It’s a hard job – not your usual job. I am going to be hanging up the gun now.
"This job is not fun."
Chaovarej says he has witnessed every execution at Bang Kwang since beginning work as a corrections officer in 1972. After assisting with several of the executions, cleaning the gun and preparing the prisoners for their final walk, the father of three conducted his first execution in 1984. He was paid an extra Bt2,000.
Since then Chaovarej has executed many people – hit men, drug dealers and murderers, plus a few big-time politicians he doesn’t care to name. It would not be good for the families of the dead, he explains.
"I do remember the last words a convicted hit man said to the monk," he recalls. "He told the monk he had killed many people and asked for karn hai aphai [forgiveness].
"Hit men kill people for money and they know that someday someone is going to kill them, and they are prepared to die."
Even so, the hit man feared the spirits he believed he’d encounter in the afterlife, Chaovarej adds with a smile.
So how did the head executioner cope with the traumatic nature of the job?
"Sometimes I played the guitar and listened to music to relax. My family is proud of what I do. I leave the job at the office. Everyone in my family is into the music."
Chaovarej’s musical roots stem from his experience jamming in an air force band during the Vietnam War at army bases near the border with Laos.
"I played in the officers’ clubs in Ubon Ratchathani and Udon Thani from 1968 to 1970," he explains, breaking into the chorus of "House of the Rising Sun".
After completing a two-year stint in the service, Chaovarej worked as a translator for Union Oil in southern Thailand before moving to the outskirts of Bangkok to begin his job as a prison guard.
Situated on the banks of the Chao Phya River in Nonthaburi province, Bang Kwang opened its gates in 1931. Machine-gun executions in Thailand began in 1935, replacing death by decapitation using a sword. The first gun, an original German Bremner automatic rifle, took 230 lives before it was replaced.
The government halted executions in 1987 but re-introduced the death penalty in 1996. Since then, the rate of death sentences and executions has increased as successive governments have taken harder lines against ya ba (methamphetamine) dealers. So far, the bulk of convictions have been handed down to "mules" – or drug couriers caught with more then 100,000 pills, which earns them the death penalty.
Pla lek nai ang yai, (small fish in a big pond), as the locals like to call them, are hauled in while big dealers usually escape such punishment.
The busiest execution day since the Thaksin government came to power was April 18, 2001, when five men, including four with drug convictions, were tied to a post and gunned down in "the room to end all suffering" – Bang Kwang’s death chamber. In a bid to deter drug traffickers, the government allowed journalists and cameramen in to witness preparations for the executions by Chaovarej and a fellow executioner.
"I killed the first prisoner, and then they tied two prisoners to separate poles at the same time. There were many officials there and it was a very hard job to do. But it was my duty," Chaovarej says.
"When the job order comes, there is no time to think. They told us about the executions at lunch – time for the afternoon executions. For five people in one day, you have to check the guns, prepare the ammunition."
Graphic footage of the condemned men in leg irons, kissing the ground before being led into the execution chamber, created an immediate and harsh backlash from international human-rights groups.
Amnesty International condemned the killings and the government’s move to publicise them.
"It is outrageous for the new Thaksin government to flaunt its tough anti-drugs stance by executing people. The death penalty provides no solutions to growing crime rates. Instead, it entrenches a culture of violence in society", the group said.
The outcry meant the first "public" execution would also be the last and focused debate on whether use of a machine-gun was a brutal method of killing condemned prisoners.
Under the system set to be replaced, the executioner blasted a round from a 15-bullet clip at the condemned, who was tied to a pole behind a curtain 10 metres way. The prisoner’s hands were tied but clutched incense and a lotus blossom, in accordance with Buddhist custom.
Subsequent executions have been low-key and few in number, but the Thai courts have responded to the government’s hard line by continuing to hand down death sentences to dozens of drug traffickers.
On July 26, 2001, a record 19 people – 16 men and three women – were sentenced to death by the Criminal Court in Bangkok for major drug-trafficking offences. The following month another 17 got death sentences on the same day. Many of them are now pursuing appeals.
Chaovarej shot his last prisoner in December 2002. "I feel sorry for every prisoner in jail," he says. "I understand about Thai law. Jail is the last step for the prisoner. But the laws of society must be upheld and those that run against them must be punished."
Currently, 6,533 inmates, including 639 foreigners, are crammed into Bang Kwang, originally designed for about half that amount. Since 1935, 319 prisoners including three women have been executed by firing squad in Thailand.
The number of people who have received the death sentence has tripled over the past two years, with more than 900 prisoners now on death row, including more than 30 who have exhausted all forms of appeal. Two thirds of them are drug dealers.
In a perverse way, some say the condemned are actually lucky – several thousand people were gunned down or otherwise killed in the government’s controversial anti-drugs crackdown from February to May of this year. Police described the killings as "silencings" by drug-gang members desperate to avoid capture. Human-rights groups allege most were extrajudicial murders by law enforcement officers or their underlings.
Chaovarej is philosophical about his role in the Thai justice system. "Everything is a melody of life. Sometimes high and sometimes low," he says. "After each execution, I make merit from my heart. You can’t just go to see a monk and your sins are gone."
He pauses for a moment and then hits a few strings and sings an old Beatles favourite. "Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away. . . ."
Soon, Chaovarej’s heart will beat to a lighter rhythm.
Steve Sandford
Special to The Nation