Since December 2023, “Boom” Chirawat, a 32-year-old online clothing vendor, was charged with violation of Article 112 of the Criminal Code for sharing three Facebook posts. He was convicted by the Lower Court and sentenced to 6 years imprisonment without suspension. He applied for bail while he appealed his case, but it was denied. At present, Chirawat is remanded in custody in the Bangkok Remand Prison while his appeal is pending.
For over 200 days, Boom’s family has been waiting to welcome home their husband and father. Despite more than ten bail requests, the Court persists in dismissing the requests by claiming that there is no reason to change the order. Freedom Bridge had the opportunity to speak with “Phrae” (pseudonym), Boom’s wife, about her life and the impact of being separated from her husband, who was always by her side through the ups and downs.
“Phrae” and “Boom” got to know and dated each other ever since they were undergraduate students, five years before their eventual marriage. They have been taking care of each other for around 10 years.
According to Phrae, she and Boom helped to build up their business together as both of them liked to work and worked hard. They kept finding items to sell and never stopped working. They have a daughter together who is almost 6. The day of Boom’s court decision coincided with their daughter’s birthday. From this day forward, Boom could not return home with them.
We asked Phrae to look back over the past 3 years. The first minute she learned that Boom was charged, she was shocked. What was even more shocking was that she learned that the person who reported the case was one of her own relatives.
A relative who grew up in the same house reported the case against her husband
“When the letter (police summons to answer to charges) arrived at Boom’s parents’ home, it was during the outbreak of Covid-19, 3 years ago. Boom and I had tested positive for Covid-19 and were receiving treatment at the hospital. Our daughter was around 2, and I asked my relatives to look after her. It took us about two weeks to get better.”
Phrae said that her first impression upon seeing the summons that Boom’s mother sent to her via phone message was “perplexed”. Then, her mother-in-law sent her a picture showing the name of the person who reported the case. Phrae realized that the person who filed the complaint against her husband was in fact a relative who grew up with her in the same house.
“I was completely taken aback that the person who filed the complaint was my relative. I was shocked and wondered which posts Boom has shared. We were then engaged in online business as well and we logged in with a wrong password, and as a result we were locked out of our Facebook account. We could not get in to look at our posts. We did not know what had happened and got to see it when we went to answer to the charges. The person who reported the case had captured all the images.”
Fighting the judicial process while battling cancer
Phrae further said that after recovering from Covid-19, which took them nearly one month in total, Boom entered the judicial process and answered to the charges at the Yannawa Police Station.
“After our recovery from Covid-19, which took us nearly a month, we went to the police station. During the police inquiry, someone introduced us to the Thai Lawyers for Human Rights (TLHR). Since then, we have been in touch with TLHR.”
Boom might be interested in politics, but Phrae does not follow politics and hardly reads news since she has to work from dawn to dusk.
“Day in and day out, I wake up at 5.30 am to drive my child to school. From 7.30-8 am I go to work, and then return to my father’s home for 1-2 hours, and then come back to work. Around 8-9 pm, I pick up my child and we go home. Then I go to sleep and wake up again at midnight or 1 am to work. Boom and I got home late as we like to look for things to sell. We kept doing this, buying and selling thing, although we did not have a lot of money to put into it.”
“While giving this interview, I sold sell several items. Before, we used to be so busy packing things to sell. We did everything by ourselves, every step. We only slept four hours and worked so hard. But now I have to do everything by myself. Then, I tried to decrease the workload since I could no longer keep up with it.”
After Boom was indicted on 8 February 2022, the South Bangkok Court granted him bail pending witness examinations on 25 April 2023 and 27 – 29 September 2023. Nonetheless, while Boom was defending his case, the symptoms of Phrae’s illness appeared.
“I felt I was ill around 13 February last year. I used to live my life like a teenager and worked so hard. One day, I found a lump on my breast, but didn’t have the guts to go for a test. At first, I thought I had a blocked milk duct as I was breastfeeding my child and thought it would be fine.”
“Then one night, it hurt until I could not fall asleep. It felt acutely painful like I was getting bitten by ants inside. I went to see the doctor and had a mammogram. I went to several doctors and they found there were three lumps in my breast. The doctors said they were likely to be cancerous. The largest one was around 4.75 centimeters and it had spread to my lymph nodes.”
Phrae pointed her finger to her left arm from her collar bone downward. It featured slightly dried skin due to chemotherapy treatment.
“I have had all of my lymph nodes removed. I can no longer feel anything, even a mosquito bite, on my left arm as all my lymph nodes have been removed. I cannot stretch my arm to the fullest and have had a unilateral mastectomy. The skin on my left arm is pretty dry. Looking closely, you’ll find the cream applied by the doctor to my skin. But everyone says I do not look like a cancer patient. I have to insist that, ‘You guys…I do (have cancer).’ I can barely run now. It’s so tiring.”
Phrae explained that her cancer treatment coincided with the time she had to help Boom in his defense.
“Every three weeks, I received chemotherapy, for a total of about eight times in the past half year. After chemotherapy was done, I had a mastectomy. While receiving radiotherapy, I was found to have another lump in my ovary. The tumor was six centimeters long, quite large. Now, I have had a unilateral oophorectomy. Actually, I have to have them entirely removed. Now, I am practically sterilized.
Phrae said that she can always look after herself, provided that Boom can help to look after their child. Boom only went with her to see the doctor once during the entire course of treatment. Since then, she has to drive herself to receive the chemotherapy treatment and drive herself home.
“After getting charged, Boom tried to reorganize his working life. He knew that one day he could face it (imprisonment). He had that in his mind. When he was out on bail during the witness examination, he was planning his life in terms of what he had to do in the future.”
“Do you know that on the judgment day, 6 December, last year, it coincided with my daughter’s birthday. I broke down in tears that day. During the period of the trial, I had had eight chemotherapy treatments and two operations to treat my cancer. The last day I had radiotherapy was 2 December. On the following day, Boom suggested we go on a vacation, when I was totally bald. After all the chemotherapy, the operations, and the radiotherapy, on the 6th, he was sent straight to jail.”
Phrae said that despite having had a unilateral oophorectomy, leaving the other one to produce hormones, her the remaining ovary appears to have some problem after her latest health examination, just before giving this interview.
“I have been through ups and downs. Frankly speaking, I am like a person in their 50s. I have had cancer, and my husband has gone to jail. Life has taught me that I have to look after myself. When life becomes too harsh, I could only say it out. Yesterday, I had a CT scan, and the outcome was not so good. The doctor said I might soon need another operation. It made me feel so stressed. I told the doctor that I need more time. I want Boom to get bailed out and to look after our daughter, and then it will be a good time to have the operation.
“The lump inside does not pain me. I can only feel some lower abdominal pain during menstruation. In addition, my tumor marker has surged to nearly double, probably due to my stress. I had a blood test on 9 July. But I knew that I have not had enough sleep since 1 July. I went to bed late, as there was too much to think about, too much work, etc. It is very stressful. Cancer is something that may stabilize, but cannot be cured.”
“I am very concerned about this. I have asked my doctor to postpone the oophorectomy twice already. I feel concerned about my daughter and am afraid that once I have the operation, no one will take care of my child. There is no one else to provide for our family. I should rest and recover, but I cannot stop working.”
An accidental single mom, a cancer patient, and a political prisoner’s wife
Being a cancer patient while having her husband put in jail is already very hard for Phrae. But as a mother and small business operator, Phrae has several additional hats to wear and manage. Since Boom has been imprisoned, Phrae has to take care of all the business by herself. Throughout our nearly two hours of conversation, Phrae received more than 6-7 calls. Work is unavoidable. Every minute lost is income lost for her family.
“I have to carry on with the business that we have created together. It does not mean the business can be good like before. Before, I worked in the background and Boom dealt with our clients. They still ask about him. I can only say that he is busy with something. I have to keep saying that.”
Phrae told us that the biggest blow to her family business was the shutdown of their clothing shop.
“We did many things, selling oversized clothes online, finding some miscellaneous items to sell, and we used to operate a clothing shop. But when Boom was jailed, no one could look after the shop. We had to shut it down as I could not handle so many things at one time. And my health was getting worse anyway.”
“…Actually, I do not worry much about him since he still has his father, his mother and his younger siblings. But our daughter, only has Boom and me to provide for her. Now, he is in there, while I am outside, but I am not well. It’s not that we do not trust our grandparents. Everyone always wants to help our child. But I want to see my child growing up properly at different stages of life. So I want him to come out, maybe at least for a year. At least, he could come to look after our child. Then, I can get my treatment. I know that he will have to go back in.”
“Frankly speaking, I am now paranoid about dying. I fear that there will be no one to look after my child, and no one will provide money to buy Boom’s food.”
Phrae said that right now she has to talk with Boom seriously about how to raise their child. She probably needs to have the operation soon since it has been postponed for over two months.
“I know I am a strong person. I can fight for my life. But for several months, I have been unable to save any money. I am just getting by. Right now, I am seriously exploring possible solutions. If he has to stay in the prison in the long run, and if I desperately need the operation, what can I do? That means I can no longer earn money. I have had problems with the banks since everything is in Boom’s name. The banks do not allow anyone else to complete transactions.”
This was a heavy blow for the business. Even before he was imprisoned, Boom’s bank accounts were frozen as some scammers had taken over his accounts and used them to defraud people.
“Even after I cleared the matter, the accounts are still frozen. In order to unfreeze them, the banks insist that Boom has to request it himself. If Boom cannot get out, we cannot do anything. All the money was meant to be our daughter’s tuition fees.”
“You dad is in a large hospital. People inside suffer from communicable diseases.”
Throughout the entire conversation, Phrae neither cried nor showed any melancholic feeling. But when the conversation turned to her daughter, we could feel her trembling voice.
“She appears to be quieter now. I have no idea if it stems from this issue, or if it has merely resulted from her growing up. She gets to see Boom often. Every time, she was sick and absent from school, I would bring her for the prison’s visitation. It prompted her to ask why I always took her to visit her father when she was absent from school. Even though I manage to provide for myself, we do receive help from our families. My key spending is on the payment of installments for our house, car and my child’s tuition. I have to pay product advertisement every month as well.”
“Asking about the impact on my child, I can feel she lacks someone to look after her. She misses her father sometimes. The request to have visitation via Line chat has always been filled up, so quickly. The reservation starts at 9 am, and it gets filled up in five minutes later. I need to look for activities to occupy my child’s attention, to keep her excited and to forget about her father. Like today, I told her we would go to IKEA to eat at her favorite eatery.”
“If Boom did not face a legal case, we used to plan to send her to an international school. Then, she was getting into preschool level. Actually, we reserved her a place already (at an international school). But I alone cannot earn enough. Eventually, she ended up at another school, which still charges pretty high tuition fees, albeit not as expensive as the international school. She gets upset sometimes realizing other children have their fathers, and where is hers? My father never comes to pick me up from school. When there is any event at school, I have to go there just by myself, while other children have both parents to attend.”
That’s why Phrae kept telling her child that her father has not gone anywhere. It’s not like Phrae herself, whose mother has passed away and only remains present in photos.
“Look, I no longer have my mom. I only live with our grandpa, and we manage to get by. Nothing is perfect, my dear. I told my daughter that my mother only exists in a photo. But at least, you can still visit your father. When I took my child to the prison, I would tell her that her father was suffering from a severe communicable disease. My child might think this was a hospital with many sick patients. I think about clarifying this with her, but maybe when she is a bit more grownup.”
Hoping to get bailed out pending appeal
Phrae said that throughout the time Boom has been in jail, she has gone to visit him almost every day and bought him things to eat. Despite getting to eat food purchased by a charity fund, Boom still looks forward to eating special food from his family.
“He eats a lot. I buy him food every day. Since he has been remanded, I have gone to visit him almost every day as he asked me to come. If I really could not go, I have to tell him in advance. Without me, he is fine having the visitation from his parents. It does not affect me much for having to visit him since I can work from anywhere.”
“I told his parents that they should not think too much. I can think for them since his parents do not seem to understand much about the legal process.”
“As to the Appeals Court’s trial, we have discussed that eventually, he would receive at least six years. Without the appeal, it would still be six years. Therefore, we look forward to a reduced penalty from the Appeals Court since he has never been convicted in any case. Let’s try this, as they may give us some reprieve. And after being incarcerated for a while, he can ask for parole. Other people who got six years, could get it reduced to four. I told him four years is ok for me."
“I told Boom that time does not wait for anyone. After you come out, you might not get to meet me. We have no idea what the future will hold. This Monday, I just rammed my car into another one causing my license plate to become loosened. I told him anything can happen, life or death. Now I have to live this life. I only hope that he will keep fighting to come out and take care of our child. There is no need to take care of me, just focus on our child.”
The issue that fills the conversations of the pair is Phrae’s operation.
“I told him that when I get my operation, there is no need to look after me, just focus on our child. I can only look after her as much as I can. I have to see doctor very often. Even though we live in the same house, before, Boom took charge of caring for our child and she seemed to have a closer relationship with her father than with her mother.
Anecdotally, Phrae said that if he really got bailed out, she would stop working and start being a housewife.
“Actually, it’s impossible. I have been working hard all along. I could only manage to rest one or two days. Boom and I dreamed of opening a racing circuit and selling clothes worn by motopunks. We wanted to have a small shop and sell to motopunks. We did not grow up like them. But they are not bad guys. They are quite diligent and perseverant. Waking up at 4 am, they have to push vegetable carts and work at 10 am selling clothes. They used to get rich from that and I wanted to get rich as well. I want to use the money to solve my problems, starting from servicing my debts.”
Simple dreams: Simply want to live on to advise her child how to behave and not be a burden for anyone
Phrae’s expectations about her health and other predicaments are not different from those of other people.
“I do not have much trouble. I am simply worried about my child.” Phrae kept reiterating this point. According to her, even though she belongs to a larger family with several adult relatives, and since Boom has gone to prison, none of them attacked or harassed her. What keeps her worried is her child who cannot live with her father. Support from her family helps to keep her strong.
“Initially, the doctor told me I could not live longer than two years. It will soon be two years. After living through the two years, I feel that I can live for another five years, and maybe seven years. I have no particular hope and think I cannot live long enough to see my child grow up. I only wish that she will be able to take care of herself.”
“I want to live long enough until she can make her own decisions. As she is a girl, I want to give her advice on how to live her life. Even though she has her father and grandparents, I still want to be the person to teach her things, i.e., how to wear her underwear, what to wear under her blouse, how to wear short pants under her skirt.”
“I keep telling her that I can do anything at home for her, but eventually she has to manage to do everything by herself. I want her to be able to live her own life. As to my expectations for my life, I do not want to get cured. I simply want to live the life of an ordinary person, to earn for myself and to rely on myself, not be a burden to anyone. At least, I can still walk and drive. My condition is perhaps stable, although before, I could not accept it. I live with what happens to me now.”
The future is hard to predict. As time ticks away, Phrae’s hardship in life is probably not different from Boom who is still incarcerated in prison. For Phrae, she has to handle pressure from business. Meanwhile, her health problem is taking its toll on her. This is yet to mention the unsurmountable worries she has about her small young daughter in preschool.
Phrae ended our conversation by asking out loud the question “If I happen to die before Boom gets bailed out, who will take care of my child?”
