Police arrested an alleged gold shop thief while he was caught in traffic in Thailand.

Nattaphol Sanmangmoon, 33, pretended to be a customer trying on a gold necklace at a mall in Chiang Mai province on November 5. However, he ran out of the jewellery store still wearing the item when the clerk momentarily turned away.

Police Colonel Manuschai In-thuean, superintendent of the Phuping Rajanivej Police Station, said the theft was reported at 11:30 am.

He said: 'We checked the CCTV footage and found that the suspect went into a restroom after the robbery to change his clothes. We knew he still hadn't left the mall, so we set up a checkpoint at the nearby intersection to block him.'

Police caught Nattaphol inside his Toyota Vios at the airport intersection near the mall at around 5 pm. He had changed out of his long-sleeved shirt and pants into a black sando and shorts reportedly to disguise himself.

During interrogation, he claimed he committed the theft due to his debts as he was unemployed. He said he sold the gold necklace for 38,000 THB (855 GBP), paid off the debt, and bought clothes with the remainder of the money.

He was hauled to the Phuping Rajanivej Police Station to face legal action.

Authorities said they were working to retrieve the gold necklace from the buyer.

(1 GBP = 44.41 THB)