Light shed on controversial cases
Light shed on controversial cases
JAKARTA (JP): National Police forensics laboratory (Puslabfor)
revealed in an unprecedented move on Monday portions of the truth
in connection with at least two nationally controversial and
undisclosed cases.
Chief Brig. Gen. Suwahyu and deputy chief Col. Dudon Satya
Putra, shed some light on the 1997 fire at the Central Bank
building which claimed 15 lives, and the brutal 1986 murder of
fashion model Dietje Budiasih Budimulyono.
"In the bank case, the fire was caused on purpose ... it was
pure sabotage. The damaging evidence was found on the 18th floor
of the building ... thinner had been used to light the fire,"
Dudon told reporters, during a break in a press meeting on
environmental issues.
"From the evidence we found at the crime scene, we can deduce
that the fire was a deliberate attempt to destroy important
documents, which were burnt on the four floors of the building."
Another Puslabfor officer, who requested anonymity, said a
recent reinvestigation into the case, which began in late June
this year, revealed that the documents contained data relating to
16 banks liquidated in August, 1997.
"There were also data regarding corruption by at least two
former Bank Indonesia directors," he said, refusing to elaborate
further.
Suwahyu said the actual parties, who committed the crimes
remained unidentified.
The fire on Dec. 8, 1997, dubbed an inferno by some of the
bank's employees at the time, gutted the top four floors of a 25-
story building, one of the bank's office towers on Jl. Thamrin,
Central Jakarta.
Nine of the 15 dead suffocated in lifts on the 23rd and 24th
floors of the central bank's building, which was scheduled to be
inaugurated a few months later. The other victims burned to death
on the same floors.
No official statement about the cause of the fire was ever
released. The fire was attributed in 1997 to a minor accident
caused by a welding tool, which resulted in grave consequences.
On the murder of 34-year-old pregnant model Dietje, Lt. Col.
Bambang Wahyu of Puslabfor's development division said the
declared killer Mohammad Siradjuddin, alias Pak De, was a retired
Army officer who was a trained shooter and had earlier been
posted at the Army Artillery.
Earlier, the convicted paranormal Pak De said in August last
year that he was an innocent man, who had "confessed" to the
killing, due to the mental pressure of seeing his two sons
undergo continued physical torture.
"Pak De reconstructed the entire scene in front of several
police officers. He showed us exactly how he shot, and where. A
girl was made to sit in the driver's seat, where Dietje had been
shot to death in the white Honda Accord sedan," Bambang told The
Jakarta Post.
"Pak De, who was then seated in the passenger's seat, showed
how he had pulled the girl's head to his side and fired five
shots at a very close range."
"Before this reconstruction, Puslabfor had already determined
through examination of the wounds and the gunshot residue left on
the wounds, which was the first, the second, third and so on
shots," he said.
"This was never revealed to anybody outside of the ballistics
unit. Not even the police investigators. If Pak De is no killer,
how did he know which shot was made first?"
Bambang added that the Puslabfor investigation, which went on
for six months from the time of death on Sept. 8, 1986, concluded
that the revolver belonged to a security guard of the now defunct
Bank Bapindo.
A Puslabfor report on the case failed to mention how the
revolver got into the hands of the then suspected killer, Pak De.
"The only way to uncover the mystery is if the Indonesian
courts demand a reinvestigation into it."(ylt)