Pattaya, Thailand:
In Brief:
– Eighteen gamblers were detained at a seafood restaurant in Soi Thepprasit 8 after a late-night raid on October 7th.
– Officers seized 46,980 baht, 30 decks of cards, a dealing shoe, betting mats and score screens.
– A Cambodian woman about 30 was dealing cards; a lookout was stopped before he could phone a warning.
– The restaurant’s ground floor stayed open as a front while play continued upstairs.
– Similar dens in pool villas, houses and fishing ponds have been raided across Banglamung over the past year.
Full Details:
Pattaya police broke up an illegal Tiger-Dragon card game on the second floor of a seafood restaurant late on Tuesday, arresting 18 gamblers before lookouts could raise the alarm.
At 10:36 p.m. on October 7th, Pol. Col. Anek Sathongyu, Chief of Pattaya City Police Station, led the raid with Pol. Lt. Col. Siriwat Katchamat, deputy superintendent, and Pol. Lt. Col. Arut Saphanon, deputy superintendent for investigation. Officers entered the venue on Soi Thepprasit 8.
The ground floor was still operating as a restaurant. Gambling was underway upstairs. Police said an informant had reported illegal card play on the second floor and lookouts posted inside the restaurant to watch for officers. After surveillance showed gamblers moving upstairs, police moved in. A lookout tried to phone a warning but was detained before the signal went through.
On the second floor, officers found 18 men and women placing bets. A Cambodian woman, about 30, was dealing. The group appeared startled but had no exit from the room and was taken into custody without resistance. Seized items included 46,980 baht in cash, 30 decks of cards, a card-dealing shoe, card-pushing sticks, Tiger-Dragon betting mats and electronic score displays.
Pol. Col. Anek ordered the suspects and the evidence transferred to Pattaya City Police Station for questioning before formal charges. The names of the suspects were not released.
Tiger-Dragon, a fast baccarat-style card game, is a regular target in local raids. The setup here followed a familiar pattern: a legitimate business on the ground floor, play hidden upstairs, and spotters watching the street. Other reports on the same raid said the 18 people included 10 men and eight women, and that one arrested gambler, a market vendor, told reporters the game had been running for only about three days and that she had already lost more than 20,000 baht.
The case fits a run of enforcement in and around Pattaya. We have reported several comparable operations over the past year:
– In January 2026, a hi-lo den in a rented house in Soi Phatthanakan 4 produced 31 arrests.
– In December 2025, a cockfighting ring in Naklua’s Hua Tung community led to 22 arrests.
– In August 2025, immigration and local police broke up a poker game in a residential village and arrested nine foreigners, five Chinese and four South Korean.
– In October 2025, undercover officers posing as fishermen raided a hi-lo ring at a fishing pond and arrested 13 people.
Most forms of gambling remain illegal in Thailand under the Gambling Act B.E. 2478 (1935). The main exceptions are the state lottery and betting at licensed horse-racing tracks. Organising or hosting an unlicensed game is treated more seriously than simply playing: operators, dealers and property owners who knowingly allow a den can face prison terms and larger fines, while ordinary players are typically exposed to shorter jail terms, fines, or both. Reported ranges vary by offence and by how prosecutors frame the charge, but organising a den is commonly cited as carrying up to several years in prison and fines that can reach well into the tens of thousands of baht. Foreign nationals face the same criminal provisions as Thais, with the added risk of deportation and immigration blacklisting after a conviction.
Online gambling is also prohibited, and larger network cases have drawn money-laundering charges on top of gambling counts. A proposal to legalise casinos inside entertainment complexes stalled after the government of former PM Paetongtarn Shinawatra left office in 2025, so enforcement has stayed focused on the black market rather than a licensed industry.
Police said the 18 suspects will be processed at Pattaya City Police Station and sent to investigators for prosecution.