Children's Day observed amid horror of abuse

JAKARTA (JP): The capital will celebrate National Children's Day today in a somber mood due to the recent escalation in the number of street boys who have been sodomized.

And worse news is that at least eight boys, believed to be poorly-educated and from poor families have been found killed with their stomachs torn out and throats slashed. The perpetrator of these serial killings is still unknown.

As of yesterday, police and forensic scientists have identified dozens of street boys who had been sodomized by people in their neighborhoods.

Most of the boys are teenagers who have left their poor parents in their hometowns and come to the capital to earn money for themselves.

For almost two-thirds of the day they work as street traders or beggars to earn what little money they can.

In interviews with The Jakarta Post yesterday, most street boys said they had no idea about what sodomy was until they were picked up by the police for questioning on Saturday.

"I don't like being dibo'olin (the slang for sodomized) and I didn't know that it was a crime," said Ht, 12, who claimed to have been sodomized twice.

"What I felt at the time was pain," said Am, 14, who experienced anal sex once. "I hope that it won't happen to me again."

"I didn't know what it was all about until it happened to me some time ago," said To, 13. "It was painful in the beginning but I had no way of getting away from the man. Moreover, I needed money to survive," said the boy, who claimed to have been sodomized almost every day since he was nine.

According to the teenage victims, they were paid between Rp 500 and Rp 2,000 (US 15 and 60 cents) a time.

"I used the money for lunch and cigarettes," said Purnomo, 16, who said he was sodomized once for Rp 2,000 last year at a park in Central Jakarta by a man who pointed a sharp blade in his face.

In many cases, the suspects lured them with the carrot and stick approach of a small amount of money and threats.

Psychologist Sarlito W. Sarwono said the helpless street children were easy targets for the pedophiles.

"They could be easily trapped with a tiny deal and a bit of trickery," Sarlito said.

According to the boys, they were forced to serve the suspects, who were sometimes armed.

"I couldn't get away from the man because he threatened to kill me if I left the house," said To, who left his hometown in Brebes, Central Java, at the age of nine because he was bored of watching his mother.

To is one of the boys who were sodomized hundreds of times by a 60-year-old man, residing at a small house in Pondok Gede.

"He did it to me almost everyday," he said.

To said that he could only leave the house on Saturday when the police came to arrest the man, better known as Babe (father).

The suspect is now in the East Jakarta police precinct, along with three other men, who have all been charged with having sex with underage boys.

The police had also questioned them for their alleged roles in the serial killings of the eight sodomized victims. None of them have yet been charged in connection with the killings.

Police said that they will continue to collect as much information as possible from the street boys in order to trace the suspect of the killings.

However the street boys said that the police work had disturbed their daily money-earning activities.

"We now only have few hours to earn money on the street because we spent most of the day at the police station," said Purnomo, who sometimes earned money through prostitution. (bsr)