Victim drank tea laced with cyanide

Police say six people found dead in a luxury hotel room in Thailand were poisoned with tea laced with cyanide.

Police suspect that one of the dead was behind the poisoning and that the act was due to mounting debt.

Six people were found dead by housekeeping staff at the Grand Hyatt Erawan hotel in the Thai capital Bangkok on Tuesday night.

Investigators believe they had been dead for 24 hours.

Two of the six had lent “tens of millions of Thai baht” to another deceased person for investment purposes, authorities said. Ten million baht is equivalent to nearly $280,000 (£215,000).

Confusion and mystery had previously surrounded the gruesome discovery of the bodies, with initial local reports suggesting there had been a shooting. Police later dismissed these reports.

Now, a clearer picture of what might have happened is emerging.

Police said the group of six gathered in a room early Monday afternoon.

The group checked into the hotel separately and were assigned five rooms — four on the seventh floor and one on the fifth — at a press conference on Wednesday, Bangkok Deputy Police Chief Gen. Noppassin Poonsawat said. The group went to the fifth-floor room.

The two victims, Sherine Chong, 56, and Dang Hung Van, 55, are US citizens.

The remaining four are Vietnamese citizens Thi Nguyen Phuong, 46 years old, her husband Hong Pham Thanh, 49 years old, Thi Nguyen Phuong Lan, 47 years old, and Dinh Tran Phu, 37 years old.

The group ordered food and tea, which was brought to the room at around 14:00 local time and received by Ms Chong.

A waiter offered to make her tea, but Chong declined, according to the deputy sheriff. The waiter recalled that she was “very quiet and clearly stressed,” authorities said.

The waiter then left the room – no one else is believed to have entered the room other than the six people inside. Police said there were no signs of a struggle or robbery.

Police later found traces of cyanide in all six cups of tea.