A Thai wife was arrested after allegedly running over her Danish husband in a staged car crash for a life insurance payout.

Pratheep Larsen, 48, allegedly hired a hitman to plough into her husband Pia Larsen, 63, and make it look like an accident in Nakhon Sawan province on April 21.

However, Pia survived the crash and was rushed to the hospital where he remains in a critical condition.

The greedy wife was reportedly chasing a 10 million baht, or roughly 232,000 GBP, payout she would receive from her husband’s life insurance policy should he die from an accident or natural causes.

At first, police ruled that the Danish husband Pia was accidentally hit by a passing car while riding his bicycle, but after a re-enactment, authorities believed that the crash was done deliberately.

They became more suspicious when questioning the wife, the driver and other witnesses, who all turned out to be connected to each other.

Police Major General Rapeepong Sukphaiboon said: ‘From the preliminary investigation, it seemed like a normal crash but when we saw further evidence, photographs, and the re-enactment of the incident, we had some doubts.

‘We took the driver in for questioning until he finally admitted and made sworn a confession statement with us.’

The wife had reportedly asked to divorce his husband but the Danish man refused. They previously lived in Denmark with their two children and bought several properties in Thailand with a combined value of around 20 million baht, around 462,600 GBP. She stood to inherit the properties in addition to the insurance money she would get from the man’s death.

Police said it later emerged that the driver, Ekkasit Wichacharn, 24, was the nephew of wife Pratheep’s friend Jaemchan Khamkaew, 60, who had a prior charge of contract killing ten years ago but it was later dropped.

Ekkasit’s statement revealed that his aunt Jaemchan reportedly plotted with the wife and promised him a new car if he successfully killed the Danish man as well as an additional 10,000 baht, around 232 GBP, to repair his vehicle.

His aunt Jaemchan was arrested along with Pratheep on April 28 and they were remanded in custody during further investigations while the Danish man remained at the hospital.

Police Major General Rapeepong Sukphaiboon added: 'There are a number of people involved in the case as suspects. We have denied them bail.

'We hope that the full picture will become clearer when we have a chance to interview the Danish man, who we believe is the victim in this case.'