Meach Bunrith is known as the most powerful brothel owner and one of the most abusive pimps in the border town of Poipet in Banteay Meanchey province, a major point for smuggling goods to and from Thailand. He is said to have powerful military backing, and off-duty but uniformed gendarmes and soldiers work as armed guards at his brothel.
On June 17, Meach Bunrith severely beat Nguyen Thi Poeung, a twenty-four-year-old woman who worked in his brothel. Four days later, she died in a local clinic. On June 25, three prostitutes, one of whom had been previously in touch with the human rights organization Adhoc, escaped from Meach Bunrith's brothel and reported the death of Nguyen Thi Poeung to Poipet police. On June 26, a mixed force of gendarmes, police, military, and militia raided the brothel.
Meach Bunrith was arrested on charges of involuntary manslaughter and transferred to the provincial town of Sisophon for detention in the Banteay Meanchey provincial prison. Twenty-one prostitutes and a woman who worked in the brothel as a cook were found in the raid and allowed to go free; the brothel was then closed. The raid, brothel closure, and arrest were hailed as a major victory by human rights workers. Soon after hisrelease, Meach Bunrith reopened his brothel. In fact, the evidence against Meach Bunrith was overwhelming.
Immediately after Meach Bunrith's June 26 arrest, personnel from Military Region Five and the gendarmerie obtained detailed witness statements from more than a dozen women attesting to the fact that they had witnessed the fatal beating.
They said Meach Bunrith beat Nguyen Thi Poeung after she refused to have sex with customers because she had recently had an abortion. He hit her on her stomach with the flat side of a cleaver, kicked her thigh, and stepped on her abdomen several times, causing her to bleed heavily. He then dragged her to the bathroom, where he dumped her next to the filthy latrine area for the night, where rats and cockroaches ran over her body.
