Ex-Calgarian recalled as quiet and generous

By Andrew Burke; with files from Stephane Massinon and Sherri Zickefoose, Calgary Herald.

At a nondescript house in an unremarkable corner of Bangkok called Peekmai Village number 1, the sign nailed to the front door said “Home Sweet Home.” But inside, two women were sitting on a worn rosewood lounge and shaking their heads. “Did you say John had been arrested?” asked Sukontha Klaisud, a middle-aged Thai woman and the owner of the house. “Why? By who? What has he done?”

Sukontha has spent at least seven years living in the same house as John Charles Wrenshall, 62, a former Calgarian arrested in London on Monday and accused of masterminding a Bangkok pedophile ring.

Wrenshall was detained at Heathrow International Airport after leaving Bangkok for Canada. According to the U. S. Justice Department, the man described as quiet, generous and hardworking by his colleagues was also a serial abuser of young boys.

A grand jury indictment from the U. S. District Court in New Jersey alleges Wrenshall used his Bangkok home as a brothel for pedophiles, hosting men who flew to Thailand specifically to have sex with boys that Wrenshall had been paid to procure. The encounters were recorded in graphic photographs and video. The indictment specifies offences carried out between 2000 and 2002, but does not say at what address the offences took place; it is unclear exactly where Wrenshall was living at that time.

For Sukontha, however, the actions described in the indictment don’t fit with the man she knows. “I can’t believe he could do what they say,” she said on Friday. “He never brought boys here, never. We live here with him and we would know if anything like that was happening, but it hasn’t. I cannot believe it.”

The house is a two-storey, suburban-style home in semi-rural Nonthaburi, more than an hour by road from central Bangkok. A large portrait of Thailand’s revered King Bhumibol hangs on one wall; several stuffed toys are scattered about; freshly ironed washing hangs in a corner; and a poodle cross is panting at the door.

Sukontha paints a mundane domestic picture, characterizing Wrenshall as a mild-mannered old man who woke at 5 a. m. to make the long drive to work at the respected AUA Thailand Language Center, returned home at 7 p. m. after battling Bangkok’s traffic, ate with her family and went upstairs to bed.

However, it is unusual, even in a country full of unconventional relationships between western men and Thai women, that Wrenshall was remarkably generous to Sukontha and her family but apparently asked for little in return.

“We lived as a family, and John was part of our family,” she said. “But John always lived upstairs, and we lived mostly downstairs; it wasn’t like we were husband and wife.”

Speaking through a translator, Sukontha said she first met Wrenshall during the 1990s, when he made several trips to Thailand from his home in Canada. In 1999, he relocated to Bangkok after being sentenced to one year in prison for abusing choir boys from Calgary’s Cathedral Church of the Redeemer. Sukontha says she had not heard of this case.

Wrenshall came to the village eight years ago and rented land from her.

Sukontha added: “But people around here didn’t know him very well.He kept to himself and only spoke a little Thai. We don’t know that much about him.” It seemed an odd statement coming from a woman who had lived so long under the same roof, a roof that Wrenshall himself had paid to build.

Upon further questioning, her family becomes more eager to demonstrate that Wrenshall could not possibly be a pedophile. One of Sukontha’s daughters-in-law, a woman calling herself Ice, leads the way upstairs to Wrenshall’s room. “Look wherever you want, it’s just a normal room,” she said.

Furniture was spread sparsely across the grey linoleum floor tiles, with just a double bed, wardrobe bearing neatly pressed shirts and slacks, a filing cabinet, bookshelves and a single white plastic garden chair. The shelves were filled with English teaching texts and a mix of novels in English and simple Thai.

“You see, there is nothing unusual here, is there?” said Somboon.

There’s also a sense of disbelief at the AUA Thailand Language Center, a large not-for-profit English school where Wrenshall had worked for about 81/2 years, as it is at Wrenshall’s home.

Former co-worker Dolores Parker said Wrenshall’s fellow teachers are stunned.

“There wasn’t a person here who wasn’t shocked. One teacher cried herself to sleep; it was sad,” said Parker.

As a man who taught people aged 15 to 60, Wrenshall was described as a model employee.

“We only know one side. It’s all positive: he was good with the students, he handled them very well. He was a real professional,” said Parker.

“He was a mild-mannered person. He never raised his voice, he did his job well.”

At the Australian university where Wrenshall completed a master’s in education, he was described as a quiet man.

“He seemed a loner,” University of Wollongong lecturer Ken Cruikshank said in an e-mail.

AUA director Adul Pinsuvana said he “still can’t believe” Wrenshall has been arrested.

He said Wrenshall’s most recent contract was worth 60,000 baht ($2,100 Cdn) a month.

The school has more than 150 foreign teachers on its books and does not conduct background checks on them, but Adul said it would probably introduce background checks in light of this case.

While Wrenshall sits in an English jail awaiting trial in New Jersey, people who keep an eye on the issue of child sexual exploitation say the federal government should be sending a louder message to discourage the practice.

Beyond Borders, a Canadian group that monitors the sexual exploitation of children, says Thailand has become the go-to destination for people seeking sex with young children.

Spokeswoman Corey Martell said the federal government could be saying more.

“It’s not acceptable . . . they’re going to other countries where there is an economic and social disparity and they’re abusing that,” said Martell.

“Even though it’s not happening in our own backyard, it’s not OK to go to somebody else’s backyard just because you have the money and the means to do it,” she said.

A Thailand-based group affiliated with Beyond Borders called End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Traff icking of Children for Sexual Purposes, says Thailand has a long-standing problem with child sexual exploitation.

Often, victims may be poor, come from ethnic minorities or displaced communities and can be boys and girls. Some have already been victims of abuse and neglect before becoming child prostitutes, according to the organization.

“The physical violence involved in the sexual exploitation of a child results in injury, pain and fear, while the acute psychological distress of sexual exploitation results in guilt, low self-esteem, depression and, in some instances, suicide,” the organization wrote in a 2008 report on child sex tourism.

Andrew Burke Is A Freelance Writer Based In Bangkok, Thailand.