Killer of Indonesians in U.S. still at large

Killer of Indonesians in U.S. still at large

JAKARTA (JP): City police officers still refuse to say if they have made any progress in their investigation of last year's killing of two Indonesians and an Indian in Los Angeles, U.S.A.

"There's been progress but no information can be released yet," City Police spokesman Lt. Col. Bambang Haryoko told reporters yesterday afternoon.

The suspect is still at large.

A great number of media and broadcast reporters flocked the City Police Headquarters here yesterday, hoping that the officers from the crime investigation directorate would be willing to talk about the case.

After waiting for several hours, Bambang informed the media people that the head of the major crimes unit, Lt. Col. Gories Mere, failed to meet with the reporters as he was "suddenly called by the city prosecutors about another case."

The deaths of the two Indonesians and the Indian in Los Angeles first appeared in Forum Keadilan in its latest issue. The weekly linked the death of a young businessman at the house of actress Ria Irawan here early last year and a Los Angeles-Jakarta drug syndicate.

The decaying corpses of the three bodies were discovered late last month by the local police, four months after being kept by their murderer in a storage locker in Los Angeles.

Among the bodies was an Indonesian woman identified as Gina Sutan Aswar, 28, who had been reported missing two years ago.

The other two bodies were identified as Eri Tri Harto Darmawan, 26, and Surish Michandani, 45.

A Los Angeles Times report quoted local police as saying that two of the victims had been beaten to death while the other one was shot.

The Los Angeles police issued a warrant for the arrest of 30- year-old Harnoko Dewantono, nicknamed Oki, who is also Eri's brother.

Oki is now believed to be present somewhere in Indonesia. ask help from Jakarta police are still unconfirmed.(bsr)