Farcical investigation

Commenting on an ongoing murder investigation is tricky, not only because it could be seen as an obstruction to justice, but also because there is no solid evidence for us to base our comments on. Thus, for some time, we have refrained from commenting on the murder of journalist Fuad Muhammad Syafruddin, who died after an attack at his Yogyakarta home on Aug. 13, to let the police conduct the investigation. Now that police are claiming to have found the murder suspect and are pushing for a court trial, we feel compelled to comment because of irregularities in the way the probe has been conducted, and the controversy it has drawn.

From the official statements, it is clear that the police believe they have a solid case to pin the murder on the one and only suspect: Dwi Sumaji. They have a signed confession. They have the motive: jealousy. The victim, police say, was having an affair with the suspect's wife. And finally, they have scientific evidence: bloodstained clothes and a bloodstained iron rod believed to be the murder weapon taken from his home.

But the police case has some shortcomings. The sole eyewitness to the attack, Fuad's wife, said the suspect was not the man she let into her house on the day of the attack. The suspect has retracted his signed confession, which was apparently made without the presence of a lawyer. He later told his lawyers that he had been promised large sums of money if he took the rap. In addition, he has an alibi: His wife insisted that he was at home on the day of the murder.

Dwi's wife has denied having an affair with Fuad, an old school friend whom she had not seen for many years. Fuad's wife, on the other hand, has been further aggrieved by the police accusation that her husband had been unfaithful. If the motive was indeed concocted as these two women believe, then there is nothing more heinous than slandering a dead man.

Then there is also the controversy about the victim's blood sample, "loaned" by relatives of the victim when he was still lying in the hospital. The police have never produced a receipt for the blood sample, and they now claim to have thrown the sample into the sea, in the belief that it would lead them to the killer. There is a growing fear among lawyers representing the victim's wife that the blood sample might have been used to smear the evidence seized by police from the suspect's home.

Then there is the questionable method of the arrest and of extracting the incriminating confession: The suspect was driven around town, taken to a motel, given some alcoholic drinks, sent to a room with a call girl, and received various promises before he made the confession.

The police's case lacks credibility. It is a circumstantial and weak one at that. It remains to be seen whether or not it will stand up in court. On the evidence we have, it should not. But who can tell how a court in this country decides cases these days?

One thing for sure, by insisting on a trial, the police have virtually foreclosed other possibilities regarding the killing, such as a different killer or killers, or a different motive -- one closer to Fuad's line of work as a journalist, who had been critical of the establishment in Bantul district. Investigators did look into such a possibility, but they dropped it altogether, saying that they could not find any leads.

The National Commission on Human Rights and the Association of Indonesian Journalists have appealed to investigators to keep an open mind regarding the possibility that the killing could have made by someone else and that it was related to the critical articles Fuad had written for his Bernas newspaper.

If the press has been particularly strong in its coverage of the murder investigation, it was more than simply camaraderie. There is a growing concern that if this case is not resolved in a satisfactory manner, it would be doomsday for press freedom. The press would not be the sole victim: freedom of expression and ultimately, democracy would be among the casualties. The nation's failure to uphold justice will also be detrimental to democracy.

While it is not our intention to obstruct the work of the police, we hope they will keep an open mind and not rush the prosecution based on their weak evidence. This murder case is increasingly turning into a tragic comedy of errors, similar to the investigation and trial of the people suspected of killing labor activist Marsinah in 1993. That investigation and the subsequent trial, we may recall, saw the authorities committing one mistake after another, producing one white lie after another, to pin the murder rap on a group of people, only to be exonerated later on by the Supreme Court. At a time when the police's credibility is coming under questioning, they cannot afford to turn Fuad's murder case into yet another farce.