Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the possibility of criminal background checks associated with Thai Visa Extension. I made a video contemporaneously with this one wherein we were discussing Thai Retirement Visas, specifically extensions associated therewith and the issue of criminals in Thailand and law enforcement trying to root out if you will, foreign criminals in Thailand. As we have discussed in many videos at this point, in a prior article from the Bangkok Post, Police General Surachate "Big Joke" Hakparn was quoted in the Bangkok Post as noting some displeasure if you will, his feeling that certain regulations associated particularly with the Retirement Visa needed to be tightened up and in that, and it was kind of an interesting article because it was a juxtaposition if you will between the issue of law enforcement and foreign criminals in Thailand and then sort of, the connection to my mind was a little bit tenuous within the article but I sort of see it in a way that “Big Joke” brought up the fact that "Look, we are trying to deal with more stringent regulations if you will associated with the Thai Retirement Visa in answer to the issues associated with law enforcement basically. 

In another video I did I was quoting an article from Stickman Bangkok wherein he noted that if you wanted to deal with that why not just enforce the law on foreign criminals, not letting foreign criminals or folks with a foreign criminal, with a foreign jail term I believe was the exact terminology, with a foreign jail term, not allow them to go ahead and get a Visa, so that implies criminal background checks. Then that sort of begs the question "could we see criminal background checks in Thai Visa Extension proceedings when they are adjudicating whether or not to grant a Thai Visa Extension?" So for example you are in Thailand, it doesn't even need to necessarily be a Retirement Visa, maybe a Business Visa, an O Marriage Visa, even an Education Visa and as we have seen and as Stickman pointed out, in the past where there have been problems involving certain bad actors for example in schools there were placed a lot of requirements associated with background checks for example for Business Visas and Work Permits in the context of teachers here in Thailand. And again, as Stickman astutely pointed out in the article I quoted in prior videos, he also pointed out that hey, look when major things happen, for example major crime events if you will, yes oftentimes here in Thailand you might see a reaction in an Immigration context especially if there were foreign nationals involved. So that's kind of why we are seeing this spike in interest in possibly changing the parameters associated with Visa issuance for foreigners as we have seen a number now at this point of really kind of grisly murders that seem to have an affiliation with foreign nationals here in Thailand. That makes law enforcement unhappy quite honestly and as I have discussed in other videos, Immigration has much more of a law enforcement paradigm than they have ever had in the past. 

Again this then brings up the question posed in the title of this video which is "could we see background checks associated with Thai Visa Extension in the future?" and the answer to this is I think we possibly could down the line. I think it is very possible, especially with digital technology being what it is, that they may require some sort of for example biometric reading, they take your prints at the time you go in for a Thai Visa Extension and if you come up on some International hot sheet or something, you have either got a warrant or it pops up that you have a record in some other country and Thai Immigration says, "look we are not going to issue you an extension and in fact you are going to have to leave the country pursuant to certain aspects of the Immigration Act of 1979, certain provisions specifically."

So yeah, I sort of get it, I get the thinking behind this notion. Do I think it is going to happen imminently? No, but when I say imminently I do not think it is impossible that we would not see this in the future. I think it's very probable in fact that likely down the line, it might not be today or tomorrow, but sometime in the years ahead we probably will see some aspect of the Immigration Process, even the extension process here in Thailand, have a criminal background check element to it.