law, which empowered them to detain suspects without placing charges against them for seven days. Among those arrested were Lt. Col. Suchart Khadsungnone, an officer of Sonthi Boonyaratglin's Lopburi-based Special Warfare Command. Reporters who witnessed the questioning said the interrogators demanded the suspects provide alibis during the August 2006 Bangkok car bomb against deposed Premier Thaksin Shinawatra. The junta was not satisfied with the police investigation and arrests and planned to make a parallel inquiry. Junta head Sonthi warned the police chief not to seek scapegoats in the military. However, the junta's plans to launch a parallel inquiry were reversed after Police Chief Kowit Wattana reported evidence to the junta's leaders. However, Pallop Pinmanee, the former Internal Security Operations Command leader who was implicated in the attempted assassination of Thaksin Shinawatra, warned the junta not to trust the police. Maj-Gen Khattiya Sawasdipol, an influential Army officer echoed Pallop's warning. Junta chief and Army Commander Sonthi Boonyaratglin said he was certain that all military men held by police for the past week were innocent. On 16 March 2007, the Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant against a tall and thin man aged 25 to 30 with crippled leg, whom police believed had planted a bomb at the Major Ratchayothin shopping center on New Year's Eve. The man was seen on a closed circuit television camera in the shopping mall. The man was charged with possessing an explosive object, terrorism and trying to kill others, and his photo was shown to the media on 21 March 2007. On 22 March 2007, police posted photographs of two suspects who were caught on closed circuit television at the Seacon Square shopping center. On the evening of 22 March, Pratya Preechavej and Yutthaphong Kittisriworraphan told reporters of The Nation newspaper that they were the men in police photos, but insisted were not the bombers. Both men were taken to a hotel on Sukhumvit Road by several senior officers and held from 10 pm until 2 am. They returned home at 4.30 am the next morning. Their story changed in a subsequent press conference at the Prawet police station, when Pratya claimed he had not worn a black jacket as did one of the men in police photos. Pratya also said he had a ponytail, and he almost never let down his hair – unlike the man in the photo – and had been accompanied by