Armed robbery in Pondok Cabe

JAKARTA (JP): A group of masked robbers broke into a house in Pamulang in South Jakarta early on Wednesday and made off with an Isuzu Panther van, mobile phone, video recorder, jewelry and cash totaling Rp 200 million.

City policeman spokesman Lt. Col. Edward Aritonang said the robbers threatened the occupants of the house, Bunadi Harlan, 49, an employee of a private firm, his wife, their only child and two housemaids, with machetes.

Police suspect the robbers were drunken youths from a nearby neighborhood.

Neither the victims nor their neighbors heard or saw any vehicle stop near Bunadi's house on Jl. Delima in Pondok Cabe Udik around the time when the incident took place, police said.

Bunadi said the robbery began at around 2 a.m. while the family was asleep.

They were awoken by strange noises at the front of the house, Aritonang said.

"Bunadi and his wife had first tried to prevent the thieves from entering by blocking the door but the burglars managed to get past them without any difficulty," he said.

The five men, one of them dressed only in his underwear, then woke the two housemaids, threatened them with their weapons and ordered them to join Bunadi and his wife in the living room, Aritonang said.

The gang then bound and gagged their captives with a curtain.

The defenseless victims then watched helplessly as their house was ransacked by the gang, Aritonang said.

Bunadi reported the burglary at the nearby police subprecinct three hours later after the gang had left the house. (emf)