If you have worked with our team of Bangkok lawyers before, you know that part of their job is to locate your passport. This might seem simple, but locating the passport of someone who has been arrested in Thailand can be tricky. Being able to get your passport back may be a requirement to post bail in Thailand, depending on what court has jurisdiction over your case. There are a few different places where your passport might be, and knowing these will help us locate it. At the time of your arrest, your passport may have been taken by the arresting officer on your case. This does not mean that he has it; in fact, we almost never see cases where the arresting Thai police officer has an accused person’s passport. Usually, the arresting officer will hand over the passport along with other evidence

and documentation to the investigating officer. When this happens it is possible to have your lawyer pick up your passport from the investigating Thai police officer. Thailand Bail’s Bangkok lawyer team always prefers to pick up the passport from the investigating officer if possible. The Bangkok court system will typically process the passport quickly, so it is important to locate it as quickly as possible.

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After checking with the investigating officer, the next place to look is your country’s embassy. The embassies in Bangkok see a lot of passports sent from the Royal Thai Police; the typical procedure is for the police station to literally put your passport into an envelope and send it standard, unsecured mail via Thailand Post to your embassy. In some cases, there are issues with the post office, and shipment gets delayed or returned back to the police station. Weekends and holidays add to the problems, and we often see passports take 1 – 3 weeks to finally reach the embassy, if it reaches it at all. Certain embassies in Bangkok are better at processing passports for people seeking bail in Thailand than others. For example, the American Embassy in Bangkok has a standard procedure that allows your lawyer to pick up your passport from the US Embassy American Citizen Services unit on Thanon Wittayu. However, other embassies, such as the Malaysian Embassy in Bangkok, often requires the investigating officer from the police station to physically go pick up the passport from the embassy before it can be used in court. Obviously, these things can slow down the bail process and your case in the court system in Thailand, so having your Bangkok lawyer pick up your passport as soon as possible is the best choice.

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Another place that your passport might be is at the court overseeing your case. There is a large case folder that contains every document associated with your case that sits at the courthouse. In Bangkok, this folder can be accessed by your Bangkok lawyer, such as the ones from Thailand Bail. Our legal team frequently does this, and knows exactly what documents (in Thai language) to fill out and who to give the forms to at the court. If Thailand Bail has already posted bail for you, your passport is probably at the court. Having your lawyer pick up your passport is important, since it gives you more options looking into the future.

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Thailand Bail’s bail lawyers have seen passports end up in other strange places besides with the investigating officer, your embassy, or with the court. However, in most cases, it is at one of these three places. For more information about how bail in Thailand is related to your passport, read about the bail process here.