BANGKOK (AP) 鈥� A construction magnate and more than a dozen other people surrendered to police Friday on criminal negligence charges for the collapse of a Bangkok high-rise during a .
Premchai Karnasuta, the president of Italian-Thai Development Co, the main Thai contractor for the building project, as well as designers and engineers were among 17 charged with the felony of professional negligence causing death, Bangkok deputy police chief Noppasin Poonsawat said.
The accused have publicly denied wrongdoing.
Ninety-two people were confirmed dead in the rubble of the building that had been under construction and a small number of other people remain unaccounted for. The building, which was to become a new State Audit Office, was the only one in Thailand to collapse in the earthquake that was centered in neighboring Myanmar. was officially ended on Tuesday, though efforts to identify body parts through their DNA will continue.
Noppasin said at a news conference that evidence and testimony from experts suggested the building plan did not meet . The Bangkok Post newspaper said police had also determined the project showed "structural flaws in the core lift shaft and substandard concrete and steel.鈥�
Thai media have reported allegations of wrongdoing in the project almost every day since the building鈥檚 collapse, many of them involving irregular documentation for the project. Their reports have highlighted the role of Italian-Thai鈥檚 Chinese joint venture partner, the , which is involved in projects around the world.
A Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for the 17 on Thursday. Noppasin said 15 turned themselves in at a police station in the morning and the remaining two were expected to do so later Friday.
The epicenter of the quake was in central , where it killed more than 3,700 people and caused major damage in Mandalay, the country's second biggest city, and the capital Naypyitaw.
Premchai鈥檚 case is his second major tangle with the law. In 2019, he was convicted of and served about three years in prison.
He was found guilty of killing protected animals and illegal possession of weapons after park rangers found him and other members of a hunting party in the Thungyai Naresuan Wildlife Sanctuary in western Thailand in February 2018.
They were found with guns and the carcasses nearby of a rare black panther, a kalij pheasant and a barking deer. The black panther, which is a member of the leopard species, had been butchered and its meat cooked up for soup.
Jintamas Saksornchai, The Associated Press
