Former JAK TV Director Acquitted in Obstruction of Investigation Case Involving the Attorney General's Office
JAKARTA — Former JAK TV News Director Tian Bahtiar has been acquitted in a case alleging obstruction of investigations in several matters handled by the Attorney General’s Office (Kejaksaan Agung, Kejagung). The acquittal was read by Presiding Judge Effendi at the Jakarta Corruption Court on Tuesday, 3 March 2026. ‘The defendant is not proven beyond a reasonable doubt to have committed the offences charged,’ Judge Effendi said in delivering the ruling. The court noted that Tian’s collaboration with Marcella Santoso was intended to monitor the coverage conducted by AGO investigators.
The receipt of a sum of money and its connection to orchestrating online buzzer activity could not be directly deemed a criminal act, but should be considered within the framework of democratic ethics. ‘Although it has been established that the defendant’s social media activity earned money from witness Marcella Santoso provided by his staff, this cannot automatically be qualified as malicious intent behind the sequence of actions to prevent, obstruct, or derail investigations, prosecutions, and court proceedings against the defendant or witnesses in corruption cases; rather it relates more to democratic ethics,’ the judge stated.
Earlier, Tian Bahtiar had been named a suspect for plotting to publish news that damaged the AGO’s image in April 2025. At that time, the AGO’s Legal Information Centre head Harli Siregar said the agency suspected a conspiracy between Tian, as JAK TV’s Director of News, and advocate Marcella Santoso and Junaedi Saibih. The alleged conspiracy was thought to form a negative narrative about the AGO, particularly its anti-corruption unit (Jampidsus). ‘They collaborated to weaken this institution and were paid for it,’ Harli said when contacted by reporters on Tuesday, 22 April 2025. The scheme was described as part of a planned strategy to sow distrust in the AGO and the justice system. ‘We are framed, the judiciary is pranked; they make it seem as though the AGO has no legitimacy, even going so far as to exploit a suit at the Administrative Court (TUN) so that its decision could be used as a basis for other considerations,’ Harli added.