Kampong Speu provincial police are on the lookout for suspects in the fatal stabbing of a taxi driver. He was then thrown from a car on Friday night at Kampong Speu Market along National Road 4.

Kampong Speu provincial deputy police chief Sam Sak told The Post on Sunday that the victim, Moeun Chek, 50, was transporting passengers from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh.

“We are not clear on how many perpetrators are involved and what their nationalities’ are, but we are looking for the people involved,” Sak said.

He said at around 8pm on Friday, members of the public found the victim lying dead with his body, shirt and pants covered in blood.

A crowd gathered around the victim, but no one knew his identity. They then contacted the authorities who inspected the body.

After an initial examination, police concluded that Chek suffered nine stab wounds – two on the left side of his neck, two on the right side of his neck, one on his right ear, one in the abdomen, one in the left finger and two in his right finger.

Sak said police did not have a motive for the killing.

After killing Chek, the assailants took his car, drove along Route 51 and crashed into a stone terrace with an automated teller machine in Kampong Chhnang province’s Sethei commune in Samaki Meanchey district.

The car’s front bumper was crushed and the front-left tire punctured. Since the vehicle couldn’t be driven further, the suspect might have escaped on foot from there, Sak said.

“According to the victim’s wife, her husband was a former military officer but had not been in the military for three years, and changed his job to be a taxi driver,” Sak said.

Sak said his forces were cooperating with the Preah Sihanouk provincial police to check CCTV camera footage in order to find out who rented the car.

The next step is to cooperate with the Kampong Chhnang provincial police, where Chek’s car was abandoned, he said.

Kampong Speu’s Chbar Mon district deputy police chief, Oeung Sopheap, told The Post on Sunday that Chek’s hometown was in Kampong Thom province, but he lived in Phnom Penh’s Chbar Ampov district before his death.