The Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday charged two men and two women over their alleged involvement in a failed attempt to rape and murder the wife and daughter of Sun Chanthol, Vice Chairman of the Council for the Development of Cambodia, a court official said.
Ek Chheng Huot, municipal court deputy prosecutor, said yesterday that four suspects had been charged with planning the murders of the senior government minister’s wife, Sun Sotha, and youngest daughter on June 13.
“I charged them for premeditating the attempted murder of the wife and daughter of senior minister Sun Chanthol,” Mr Chheng Huot said.
A police report signed by Brigadier General Loek Vannak, deputy penal crime director at the Interior Ministry, stated that the four suspects in the alleged plot were Chan Sokha, 37, Neang Sinat, 25, Sok Lak, 30, and Yan Sothearith, 25.
The report stated that Ms Sokha allegedly told police that she was ordered to organize the crime by the second wife of a wealthy Cambodian businessman. Mr Chheng Huot said yesterday that the woman who allegedly hatched the alleged plot had not yet been charged.
The police report alleged that Ms Sokha arranged for Mr Chanthol’s maid, Ms Sinat, to assist in gaining access to the minister’s house in the capital’s Sen Sok district, and for Mr Lak and Mr Sothearith to carry out the killings.
The report stated that in the early hours of June 13, Ms Sinat, opened a bathroom window and the front door of the minister’s house and fed sleeping pills mixed with meat to Mr Chanthol’s family’s dog before motioning for the two men to enter the property.
The minister’s wife, Ms Sotha, however, woke up and saw a man in her yard. She shut the door and window and the two men left the property, the report said.
Ms Sotha filed a complaint with the police three days later and after investigating the incident, police arrested the four suspects on Saturday.
Neither Ms Sotha nor Mr Chanthol, who was traveling in the provinces on the night of the attempted attack, could be contacted for comment yesterday.
