Senate panel suggests criminal prosecution against women for having sex with monks

Senate panel proposes amending the Sangha Act to criminally prosecute women involved with monks in sex scandals.

A deputy chair of a Senate panel on Tuesday proposed that the Sangha Act be amended to impose criminal penalties on women who engage in sexual relations with monks.

Warawut Tiranan, deputy chairman of the Senate committee on religious affairs, ethics, arts, and culture, raised the proposal following reports of several senior Buddhist monks being involved in a sex scandal with a Thai woman identified as Golf.

Currently, the Sangha Act does not specify criminal penalties for women, but it mandates that monks involved in sex scandals be defrocked.Warawut suggested that the Act be amended to include criminal penalties for both monks and women involved in such scandals. He also proposed that the governing monks responsible for those engaging in sex scandals should face legal punishment under the amendment.

Golf was arrested on Tuesday afternoon after weeks of scandal, when police discovered evidence that a former abbot transferred 300,000 baht from his temple’s fund to her. She has been charged with collaboration with the former abbot to embezzle from the temple’s fund.

Police indicated that more than 20 senior monks might have been involved in the scandal. Nine senior monks have reportedly left monkhood, while three others have gone into hiding.

Warawut expressed suspicion that the sex scandal involving Golf was part of a conspiracy to damage Buddhism.

He noted that Golf deliberately targeted very senior monks with high Buddhist ecclesiastical status, not ordinary monks.

“This was definitely a plot to destroy Buddhism by having senior monks defrocked. All of them were prelates,” Warawut added.
However, he admitted that he was still unsure about who was behind the conspiracy.

(2025/07/15-00:00)