Police in Thailand have arrested five people in connection with last month's death of a Quebec-born property developer, says a report.
The English-language Phuket Gazette reported Friday that one man was arrested Thursday in connection with the murder of Francis Alex Degioanni, 34, and four more were arrested Friday.
Police were unwilling to release the suspects' names, the Gazette said, adding the suspected mastermind was not among those arrested.
The report quoted Kathu Police Superintendent Grissak Songmoonnark as saying that police are now confident the killing was motivated by a business dispute. Grissak added that police are still hunting additional suspects.
Degioanni was shot at least seven times on Feb. 19 while sitting in his car outside his condominium in Patong on the island Phuket, where he lived with his three-year-old daughter and girlfriend.
Two men on a motorcycle reportedly fired at him, hitting him with several bullets.
Degioanni, a former model originally from Montreal, had been doing business in Phuket for five years, selling condominiums to foreign tourists.
According to police, Degioanni was having a dispute with a Thai partner with whom he co-owned a property development business in Phuket. Degioanni had accused the partner of cheating him out of the equivalent of about $750,000.
CTV.ca reported last month that Degioanni had told his father in January he had just gotten out of hospital after being poisoned.
"He said 'One of my partners, a female, stole some money from me and I think she tried to poison me and I think I'm going to have police protection,'" Charmaine Castonguay, who's married to Degioanni's father, Mario Degioanni, told CTV.
Castonguay said she and Mario pleaded with Degioanni to come home, but Francis refused, saying he had projects on the go that he couldn't leave.
