Bank Mandiri security guard shot dead while mailing letter

JAKARTA (JP): Central Jakarta and city police detectives spent at least two hours combing the Jl. Juanda area in Central Jakarta, after two men managed to flee the scene after allegedly shooting a Bank Mandiri security guard to death in broad daylight on Thursday.

Identified as 40-year-old Sumardjo, the security guard was shot dead while he lined up to post a letter at a mobile postal van parked in front of the Garuda Indonesia building.

The incident occurred at about 11:30 a.m., some 50 meters away from the Bank Mandiri building.

Bank security guard Waluyo said his dead colleague did not appear stressed when he went out to post a letter.

"He never seemed a stressed person. We can't think of anybody who would want to do this to him. He has worked for this building, formerly Bank Exim, for the past 17 years. Everybody knows him," Waluyo told The Jakarta Post.

An eyewitness, identified as Mulyono, said he was standing in line to post letters to the van when two men got off a Suzuki Satrya motorcycle and grabbed Sumardjo's 32-caliber gun.

Mulyono said the men then began screaming "Get Down! Everybody Get Down!"

"That was when one of the men pulled out his gun, and shot the victim in his right thigh. The victim's right hand was on his thigh. The bullet blew a hole in it too.

"The victim struggled, but fell down. The two men thought he was dead, so they walked off a bit. When Sumardjo managed to stand up, one of them shot him in the chest."

Both bullets found in Sumardjo's body were of a .22 millimeter caliber.

Mulyono added that he saw the shooter using a "long revolver".

Another witness, Dayat, said the motorcyclist's name was Soni.

Bank security guard Kardiman said that he learned of the incident after a man ran up to the bank, screaming that a guard had been shot.

Kardiman said he rushed to the scene and found Sumardjo bleeding and almost unconscious. He said he picked up his work colleague, stopped a passing taxi, and rushed to the nearby Gatot Subroto Army Hospital.

"He died on the way to the hospital," Kardiman recalled.

At the morgue, Sumardjo's four-month pregnant wife, senior Sgt. Ratih W. of the Cakung Police subprecinct of East Jakarta, was stoic in the face of the tragedy.

With glassy eyes, she said Sumardjo did not have any enemies, and politely declined to speak with journalists.

She was heard telling her sister-in-law, that she was confused as to how she would inform her five children of their father's death.

City police detectives who rushed to the hospital after inspecting the crime scene tried to console Ratih by telling her that they would soon locate the killers. (ylt)