The South Bangkok Criminal Court today (6 July) dismissed royal defamation and sedition charges filed against 7 activists for conducting a poll on royal motorcades in February 2022.

Tantawan Tuatulanon, Nutthanit (last name withheld), Orawan (last name withheld), Thakoon (last name withheld), Worrawach (last name withheld), Nattakorn (last name withheld), and Waranya Sae-ngo were found not guilty of royal defamation and sedition after the South Bangkok Criminal Court ruled that the poll only raised questions about royal motorcades and did not mention specific members of the royal family. 

The Court noted that no speech was given that defamed the King, and the use of the three-finger ‘Hunger Games’ salute is within the activists’ rights. The Court also found them not guilty of sedition because there was no intention to cause unrest and because their action was within their constitutional freedom.

The Court also found Waranya not guilty of insulting an officer on the grounds that the officer in question was not wearing his uniform. The Court ruled that Waranya does not know he was a police officer. Given that he was restraining Tantawan and that his hands touched her chest, the Court believes that Waranya has enough reason to suspect an outsider was trying to take Tantawan away and ruled that she was trying to protect someone else and to demand responsibility. 

They were, however, found guilty of refusing to follow an officer’s order and given a fine of 5,000 baht each. 

Worrawach was also found guilty of resisting an officer as he was the only defendant seen pushing metal railing used by the police. He was sentenced to 4 months in prison. The others were found not guilty. 

Activist Netiporn Sanesangkhom was also among the defendants. Netiporn was granted bail on charges relating to the royal motorcade poll, but the South Bangkok Criminal Court revoked her bail on 26 January 2024 for participating in a protest at the Ministry of Culture on 6 August 2023. She died on 14 May 2024 while in detention after a long hunger strike to demand judicial reform.

One activist, who was 15 years old at the time, was also charged and is being tried in the juvenile court.

On 8 February 2022, the activists, then associated with the monarchy reformist group Thaluwang, conducted a poll at Siam Paragon shopping mall on whether people think they face trouble from royal motorcades. They faced obstruction from mall security and the police. 9 were subsequently charged with royal defamation, sedition, and resisting an officer’s order.

The poll came at a time when netizens were expressing frustrations over road closures caused by passing royal motorcades. As far back as 2019, the hashtag #ขบวนเสด็จ (#RoyalMotorcade) trended on Twitter after a procession caused an ambulance-halting traffic jam near Victory Monument in Bangkok during the evening rush hour. The hashtag appeared again in January 2020, with many tweets expressing how motorcades disrupted daily routines. In late 2021, they became a target for protests by monarchy reform activists, leading to confrontations with the police.