March 27, 2008
BANGKOK - The tale of a struggling Thai country girl jailed for smuggling drugs who turned her life around to become a world champion boxer sounds like the stuff of Hollywood movies.
An aspiring film producer from Los Angeles has snapped up the rights to the life story of Siriporn Taweesuk, who won a World Boxing Council (WBC) title while serving time in a Bangkok jail.
"I never heard this kind of story in my life, it is an absolutely remarkable story," said Tim Zajaros, a producer and writer with a US-based company called Auroras Pictures International.
Known in the ring as "Samson," Siriporn won her freedom when she beat Japan's Ayaka Miyano to the WBC female light flyweight title in April 2007 in a battle behind bars watched by cheering inmates, according to AFP.
She was given an early release in June last year after serving more than six years of her 10-year sentence for selling small amounts of narcotics and has since upheld her title twice.
Auroras does not have any films under its belt yet, but Zajaros hopes that Siriporn's remarkable tale will woo the Hollywood studios.
"She was a prisoner who became a champion, it is incredible," he said.
He would not reveal how much he had paid for the rights to Siriporn's story, and said that the budget and casting for the film would be revealed when a studio was on board.
Siriporn, 24, said she was overwhelmed when she heard a Hollywood producer was interested in her life story.
She will again defend her title against a Japanese boxer in Cambodia on April 26, according to her promoter Chuwong Toomkit.
Since leaving jail, Siriporn has been living nearby and returns to the Women's Correctional Institute for Drug Addicts to train other inmates keen to take up boxing.
