The Lost Boy

Annice Smoel

Remember Annice Smoel? Probably not, because she's a nobody. She's the 36-year-old mother of three who was on holiday in Phuket and ended up being accused of stealing a bar mat from the Aussie Bar in Patong. She claimed it was a prank gone wrong and that her friends had somehow snuck the 1.5-metre-long mat into her tiny handbag without her noticing.

Police confronted her outside the bar and she allegedly ran away, evading arrest. She was verbally abusive to the cops, reports said. She spent 48 hours in jail. She defended herself and the world's media had a frenzy. This poor lady, they all said, she's been treated so badly in Thailand.

At one time she also admitted to trying to pay the police off to let her go. In the end, she pleaded guilty to the charges and was released.

She sold her story to the Aussie media for about 650,000 baht, says the Bangkok Post, and she proceeded to get her mug splashed all over the Aussie media while badmouthing Thailand and Phuket at every opportunity, even though the Phuket governor paid her 1,000-baht fine and publicly apologized to her.

Now she wants us to feel sorry for her because she can't take her children to Disneyland with the money she made selling her story. She was denied a visa for America because she has a criminal conviction, but rather than keeping this to herself, she's quoted as saying how devastated her and her family are.

Phuket could really do with fewer people like Annice Smoel.