Lawyers' withdrawal from Oki's case seen premature

Lawyers' withdrawal from Oki's case seen premature

JAKARTA (JP): The battle between lawyers, from two different
offices, to defend Harnoko Dewantono, alias Oki, the main suspect
in a Los Angeles triple murder and passport forgery, has not
ended yet.

An executive from the Ruhut Sitompoel, Tommy Sihotang &
Associates law office strongly protested yesterday the withdrawal
of Amir Syamsuddin and his partners, of the Amir Syamsuddin &
Partners office, from Oki's defense.

"Amir's not a gentleman!" Tommy Sihotang said, referring to
Amir's announcement on Saturday to withdraw from Oki's cases.

According to Tommy, Amir should wait until Oki's first trial,
for his alleged role in falsifying passports, which gets underway
at the South Jakarta district court tomorrow.

"He should come to court, where Oki will finally and
officially appoint the lawyer he wants," Tommy said. "Even we
still do not know who Oki will choose to defend him," Tommy said.

Amir's sudden withdrawal, he said, has further bolstered their
confidence to defend the suspect, "but it really distracts from
all the processing and work we have done."

According to Tommy, the existence of Amir and his colleagues
has, for example, blockaded his and his partners way to get
access to meet with the client.

"He was, for instance, given many opportunities by the police,
the prosecutor's office and officers at the Cipinang penitentiary
to meet Oki, while we had to follow all the complicated and
arduous procedures before meeting with him," he complained.

Tommy said his office has yet to know the strategy set by Amir
and his colleagues, following his unexpected withdrawal. "It's
not an ethical attitude for a senior lawyer like him to withdraw,
except when the client asks him to do so," he said.

When Amir was asked to comment yesterday, he simply said,
"They can say anything they want but let the truth tell the
truth."

On Saturday, Amir insisted that he and his colleagues were no
longer defending Oki, since Friday, due to a number of
circumstances, such as the unfavorable attitude shown by Oki's
father, Hendarno Hendarmin, a former banker, who sponsored the
appointment of lawyers from Tommy's office to defend his son.

"We have withdrawn as Oki's lawyers from both the case of
passport forgery and the murder," Amir told reporters again
yesterday. "In the three months of service as Oki's lawyers we
have been faced with a lot of problems. One particular problem
came from Oki's father, who was not pleased with our role."

According to one of Amir's staff, Hironimus Dani, Oki told him
that he will try to do his best to appoint lawyers from Amir's
office to defend him in the murder trial.

"No way," Amir insisted, "I'll come, in a personal capacity as
an advisor, if Oki needs me because we have gotten close to each
other and I consider him as my other son," he said.

When informed by Dani, at the Cipinang penitentiary in East
Jakarta on Friday about the withdrawal, Oki gave no comment.

"Well, everything has been done and I cannot change it again,"
Oki said.

Oki, 30, is wanted by the Los Angeles police for his alleged
role in the killing of his brother, an Indonesian woman and an
Indian businessman.

He is strongly believed to have tortured and shot the Indian
businessman, Suresh Mirchandani, to death in August 1991. Then he
battered to death Gina Sutan Aswar and Tri (Eri) Harto Darmawan,
his younger brother, in November 1992.

After being hidden in separate places, the bodies of the three
victims were kept together in a storage locker since May 1993,
before being found by the Los Angeles police in August last year.

Oki was apprehended in Indonesia early this year for alleged
passport forgery and was later questioned about the murders.

The dossiers on Oki's alleged role in falsifying passports
will be tried at the South Jakarta district court tomorrow.

Tomorrow's trial is expected to attract a large number of
spectators and members of the press because it will the first
time that Oki is seen in public since his arrest three months
ago.

Meanwhile, the murder dossiers have yet to be completed
because Indonesian police say they are still waiting for
additional information on new evidence, found early last week by
Los Angeles police detectives.

Two city detectives have flown to Los Angeles to find out the
details.

A lack of material evidence, as required by Indonesian law, is
also hindering the case because some key evidence is still being
held by the Los Angeles police. (bsr)