Pattaya-
At 2:29 a.m. on November 10th, 2025, Mr. Muhammad, a 23-year-old Australian tourist, filed a police report at Pattaya City Police Station after falling victim to what he says was a foreign gang that tricked him into buying overpriced herbal remedies and hair growth products, resulting in a loss of more than 13,500 baht.
The victim told The Pattaya News that while strolling along Pattaya Beach, a foreign man of possibly Pakistani or Afghan descent approached him, struck up a friendly conversation, and lured him to a herbal shop inside the Baywalk project in South Pattaya by promising hair regrowth. The scammer boasted that the products could “cure a wide range of ailments with immediate results.” Trusting the pitch, Muhammad purchased two bottles of herbal medicine for 650 Australian dollars—equivalent to approximately 13,500 baht—only to later discover that the items were worth less than 100 baht each on the open market. He then filed a police report with Pattaya Police seeking further action against the shop.
However, an investigation into the shop’s history reveals this is far from the first scandal. The store has been raided by police and publicly announced in press conferences multiple times. Yet, each time the cases fade away and the shop reopens, often in different locations with the same overall business model.
The Pattaya News has reported many times about situations involving tourists being allegedly defrauded in these miracle herb schemes. There have also been multiple arrests and publicity but as stated the shops always seem to return.
The general operation model is to have a friendly foreigner approach in a friendly manner a tourist on Pattaya Beach or Second Road, usually single men who are balding or overweight, and claim they have a special herbal product that can fix all their problems, like a miracle. According to police in past raids, the products are generally not licensed and vastly overpriced in the tens of thousands of Baht sometimes. The products also do not deliver their miracle promises. In some cases, when the tourist has refused to purchase the item, there is even alleged violence a the shop claims the customer must pay for the “sample” product shown to the customer or that the herbs were mixed already and are now unrefundable.
Citizens and tourists are urging relevant authorities—particularly the Tourist Police and Pattaya City administration—to enforce stricter and more serious measures against these fraud rings.
