
The thieves whose story got stolen - DanBC
http://www.bangkokpost.com/print/1156857/
======
DanBC
Woman visits temple, loses watch, accuses two children of theft, posts to
Reddit accusing them of theft, and international newspapers pick up the story.
The woman then finds her watch which hadn't been stolen after all, but these
two children were still being affected by the accusation.

[http://unpo.org/article/19970](http://unpo.org/article/19970)

> In September last year, four major British media outlets - The Sun, Daily
> Mail Australia, The Telegraph and Daily Express - ran news stories accusing
> the two tribal girls of stealing a watch from a British woman. The story was
> picked up by Thai media.

> The allegation was based on a single photo posted on Reddit.com, which
> showed the grinning woman tourist holding hands with two children in Hmong
> dress. The seven-year-old girl pictured on the right appeared to be fiddling
> with the tourist's watch. The caption said, "Girlfriend in the progress of
> having her watch stolen".

> The story of the "tiny thieves", as the girls were later labelled, was
> picked up and sensationalised by several media outlets.

> The girls and their parents were hurt by the reports. As a sad aftermath,
> the girls were asked not to go back to Wat Phra That Doi Suthep, where they
> usually earned their parents extra income by posing with tourists.

