Aussie kickboxer Jayson Tonkin has quietly returned home after seeing his young boxing buddy die in front of him near a stash of drugs in a Thai hotel room.
Joshua Goldstone, a 21-year-old Brit who trained with Tonkin, was found dead on the floor of their hotel room in the coastal Thai resort town of Pattaya six weeks ago.
The two men had been partying after training for Muay Thai fights in Hua Hin, a sleepy little Thai village just across the water which is in sharp contrast to the seedier, all-night partying allure of Pattaya.
But in the early hours of October 30, Thai police were called to Room 2412 in Pattaya’s Vogue Hotel where they found a man lying dead on the floor.
Confusion at the crime scene initially led Pattaya City Police to believe it was the Aussie who had died until it was confirmed hours later to be Goldstone.
The alarm was raised after staff rushed to the hotel’s top level when they ‘heard a commotion’ around 12.10am and found one man allegedly ‘in a state of severe intoxication’.
He was said to be ‘panicking and shouting’ because the second man was lying face up on the floor and not moving.
Thai police put out a media statement, along with photographs from inside the hotel room of a body on the floor.
Josh Goldstone, 21, left, with Jay Tonkin, 27, centre, and other Muay Thai fighters partying in the Pattaya hotel just days before the young Brit’s tragic death
Josh Goldstone with a tray of cannabis plants four days before his death from what Thai police suspected was an overdose, possibly of ketamine
Josh’s body on the floor of Room 2412 where hotel staff found Jayson Tonkin severely intoxicated, panicking and shouting because the 21-year-old was lying face up on the floor and not moving
The police statement said an Australian, ‘Mr Jayson Peter Tonkin, 27 years old, was found lying face up, shirtless, wearing black shorts, with tattoos on his body and a waist bag.
‘An inspection of the room did not find any signs of a struggle, but ketamine and marijuana drugs, as well as drug paraphernalia, were found on the table.
‘The police officers collected all evidence.’
The police also revealed that the dead man’s friend had been taken to hospital severely affected by drugs, and was possibly in a coma.
It took a day until Pattaya Police acknowledged the error, but not before Tonkin’s friends were posting alarmed messages on social media about the Aussie, nicknamed ‘The Dingo’, being dead.
The alarm turned to relieved messages of ‘praying for you bro’, but for Goldstone’s family in England, the agony and devastation was just starting.
Goldstone, who turned 21 years old six months earlier, had travelled on several occasions to Thailand, where he had embraced Buddhism while training with different Muay Thai masters.
Before his sudden death from the suspect drug overdose, he had gained a reputation as a fierce fighter and a rising young star in his sport.
His UK kickboxing mentor Steve Gladstone said he was a ‘strong spirited, kind hearted and fearless boy’ who was only just starting out and ‘the story wasn’t finished’.
In contrast, Aussie mate Tonkin is a 27-year-old seasoned fighter who had recently admitted to his addiction to methamphetamine, cannabis and other drugs.
The ABC reported Thai police seized white powder and a small glass tube, along with cannabis, from the table in the hotel room where Goldstone and Tonkin had booked into for one night, and were waiting on lab results.
Drug possession risks hefty sentences in Thailand, with ketamine classed as a Schedule 2 drug carrying a possible penalty of between one and five years in one of the country’s notorious prisons.
Jayson ‘The Dingo’ Tonkin opened up about his drug addictions in a brutally honest podcast earlier this year
Jayson Tonkin, who left Thailand after Josh’s tragic death in their Pattaya hotel room, has turned his Facebook page to private, while posting a tribute to ‘my lil bro Joshy’
A photo posted on his Instagram page just four days before his death shows Josh shirtless at a market carrying a tray of dope plants.
Cannabis is decriminalised in Thailand. In a video posted the same day as his death, Goldstone sits behind Tonkin on a bike with the tray of plants, laughing as they ride through the streets of Pattaya at night.
Thai police were reportedly embarrassed about mixing up the identities of which men were dead and alive in the Pattaya hotel room.
No charges were laid over any alleged drugs, and Daily Mail Australia has been unable to confirm that the investigation is still underway.
Tonkin left Thailand in the wake of the tragedy and is reportedly relieved the ordeal is over, but aware he was lucky to have survived and escaped any possible charges.
He has switched his Facebook page to private, and posted a tribute to Goldstone, saying, ‘Rest in peace my lil bro Joshy’ with a heart and white dove emoji.
One of his associates described Tonkin’s experience to Daily Mail Australia as having been a major ‘wake-up call’.
A Muay Thai associate said Tonkin was currently on the Gold Coast, but not reaching out to others in the kickboxing world at the moment.
In a searing confession in March this year, Tonkin admitted to using prostitutes, his addictions to methamphetamine and other drugs, and being on the run from police.
Pattaya City Police found white powder and a glass pipe on a table near Josh’s body (above) in the early hours of October 30
Josh Goldstone should have been spending Christmas at home with his family. Instead, the devastated Goldstones are preparing to bury him in Etchingham, England
In one dramatic account of being ‘hard on the meth’, he described feeling paralysed for hours and in pain, as if someone was stomping on his head with steel boots and a ‘demonic’ woman’s voice whispering in his ear.
The middleweight Muay Thai fighter opened up about his struggles in the podcast @TidesTalk, about mental health and addiction.
He said he moved to Bangkok, the ‘crazy sex capital of the world’ aged 15 with his father and ‘lost my virginity’ when ‘a prostitute at a club’ was picked out for him.
‘In Thailand you’ve got Russian prostitutes, Indian prostitutes all types of different prostitutes,’ he added. ‘You’ve got everything, mainly Thais, though.’
He was 17 when he smoked ‘my first joint’ and was soon ‘smoking 10 to 15 joints a day’, taking cocaine, and ‘sometimes I smoke weed before my fights.’
In Australia during Covid, he lived in a house with ‘a drug dealer, he sold coke, MDMA, that’s when I started learning what a bender was, two days without sleep.
‘People I attract because of who I am as a fighter are pretty much gangsters,’ he told podcasters Kahika Beckett, who is his cousin, and Chandu Grant.
‘Partying with The Dingo, have this line, have this pill, I was pretty much a guinea pig, that’s why I moved back to Thailand, falling down the rabbit hole.’
Tonkin’s fight against WBC Muay Thai middleweight champion Tengnueng Sitjaesairoong on October 20 was cancelled due to rain
Tonkin (pictured with his mother Marisa) posted on Instagram that she is ‘the only person who will love me unconditionally and prays for me everyday’
Jayson Tonkin has quietly returned to Australia from Thailand after a nightmare trip to resort town Pattaya where Josh Goldstone (pictured) died on the floor of their Pattaya hotel room
However, in Bangkok, ‘that’s when I got into meth for the first time.
‘I was starting to go hard with it, there was this one night … I got sleep paralysis.
‘I can’t move, I have heaps of pressure and weight on me and it feels like someone is stomping on my head, boom, boom, boom, like they had steel boots on … and then there was this just demonic female voice in my ear.’
When Tonkin returned to Thailand in September to prepare for a major fight, he admitted, ‘I’m not really allowed to live here, I get too lost in the madness.
‘I live in Hua Hin which is heaps quiet and good to focus on my training.’
Tonkin was due to fight WBC Muay Thai middleweight champion Tengnueng Sitjaesairoong on October 20, who he said he was ready to beat with a knockout win.
But the fight was postponed due to monsoonal rain on the day, and rescheduled for November.
Meanwhile, Tonkin, Goldstone and other fighters had left the tranquility of Hua Hin for Pattaya’s bright lights.
After Goldstone’s body was flown back to the UK, his devastated family held a funeral on December 14 near their home in southern England.
With Tonkin’s big rematch fight now cancelled and his low key return Australia, it remains to be seen what lies ahead for Tonkin’s future.
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