More than 40 people were arrested early on Saturday morning after they were caught illegally mining on private property. Pailin provincial military police commander Van Nalong said that about 41 workers were caught digging a hole, 50-metres long and more than three-metres deep, in a corn field as part of an attempt to extract precious metals from land that they did not own. He said that 36 of the suspects had been released after questioning, which revealed that they were duped into mining by the five suspects who remained detained by police. Allegedly, the suspects had told the workers that the land belonged to one of their grandfathers and offered to pay them US$10 a piece to help search for precious metals.