Former PPATK Chief Rebuts Febrie Adriansyah's Claims on Money Laundering Investigation

The Attorney General’s Office (Kejagung) presented former chairman of the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (PPATK), Yunus Husein, as a witness in facing the pretrial motion filed by Febrie Adriansyah.

In addition to Yunus, the Kejagung legal team also presented two criminal law expert witnesses, namely the Chair of the Academic Senate of Al-Azhar University Indonesia, Suparji Ahmad, and a lecturer from the Faculty of Law at Gadjah Mada University, Fatahilah Akbar.

In his testimony before the court, Yunus stated that the investigation of money laundering offences (TPPU) does not have to wait for the predicate offence to be declared legally binding.

Yunus emphasised that in money laundering cases, the most important thing is to ensure that the assets in question originate from criminal proceeds, rather than the predicate offence itself.

He explained that if the process does not uncover sufficient preliminary evidence regarding the predicate offence, the money laundering charge can still be prosecuted independently.

With the caveat, he said, that the criminal acts related to the assets must still be described in the indictment.

“If there is insufficient evidence regarding the predicate offence, the money laundering charge can still be brought as a stand-alone, independent charge. But usually the acts that generated the money are described,” he said.

On the other hand, Yunus said that in a stand-alone money laundering case, the burden of proving that the assets are not derived from criminal proceeds falls on the defendant.

Furthermore, he also referred to Article 69 of Law Number 8 of 2010 on Money Laundering, which stipulates that investigations, prosecutions and court examinations in money laundering cases are not required to first prove the predicate offence.

“Not required means it is placed as an independent crime that can be investigated on its own. It will still be proven in court during the examination,” he said.

“The defendant is given the opportunity to prove that just one of the assets is not derived from criminal proceeds, while the rest must still be proven by the public prosecutor. So to investigate, prosecute and examine in court, it is not necessary to first prove it, let alone wait until it is legally binding before proceeding to money laundering,” he added.

Yunus then explained a similar case involving former official of the Directorate General of Taxes at the Ministry of Finance, Bahasyim Assifie, in 2004-2005.

He recalled that at the time, law enforcement officials only charged Bahasyim with corruption amounting to Rp1 billion. However, he was instead charged with money laundering amounting to Rp66 billion, in line with the assets uncovered by investigators.

Previously, Febrie, in this pretrial motion, asked the sole judge at the South Jakarta District Court to annul the detention carried out by the Attorney General’s Office.

This was conveyed by Febrie in the petition of the pretrial motion filed with the South Jakarta District Court.

The man who holds a doctorate in law thanks to a dissertation on tracing and seizing assets derived from money laundering also asked the judge to declare the detention order unlawful and without binding legal force.

In his petition, Febrie challenged Detention Order Number PRIN-43/F/Fd.2/07/2026 dated 24 July 2026 issued against Febrie. His legal counsel asked the judge to declare the order unlawful along with all its legal consequences.