40 questioned over attack on Pelabuhan Ratu police office

40 questioned over attack on Pelabuhan Ratu police office

JAKARTA (JP): Forty people were being questioned yesterday in
connection with Monday's attack on the Pelabuhan Ratu police
station in Sukabumi regency, West Java Police Chief Maj. Gen.
Nana Permana said.

The station was virtually gutted and two cars and three
motorcycles belonging to the police were burned-out in the
attack. Four criminal suspects in police custody also fled when
the fire started to destroy the building.

There were no reports of injury.

"The investigation is still underway, and if they were
involved in the attack, they will be taken to court," Nana was
quoted as saying by Antara.

West Java Police spokesman Lt. Col. Istanto J. said the attack
was provoked by the precinct's decision to release a man whom the
local chapter of the Indonesian Teachers Union believed had
killed one of their colleagues in May.

Ujib Toyib Sobandi, a teacher at a local elementary school who
served on the local committee overseeing the May 29 general
election, was found dead a day after polling day in Tonjong
village.

The local teachers union, not content with the police
response, launched its own investigation into the murder.

The union not only determined the alleged murderer, but also
arrested the suspect and handed him over to the police.

Lt. Col. Istanto J. said the Pelabuhan Ratu police had to
release the suspect because there had been insufficient evidence
to detain him.

The teachers union should have limited its activities to
gathering information, he said. But the union apprehended the
suspect and interrogated him as well, he added.

The suspect's arrest amounted to a violation of Article 333 of
the Criminal Code of holding a person against his or her will, an
offense punishable with up to eight years' imprisonment. (10)