Malaysian 'died of illness'

TANGERANG (JP): Police probing the death of a retired Malaysian Army officer at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport concluded that the Bouraq Airline's passenger who had just disembarked from a domestic flight had died from an illness, rather than an accident, an officer said.

An earlier report said Abdul Rochman, 58, had fallen to his death from the mobile passenger staircase as he disembarked at 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday.

"Preliminary investigations, however, showed that Rochman died of an illness," Tangerang Police Precinct chief Sr. Insp. Augustinus Pangiruhuan said on Thursday.

The officer gave no information about the illness.

"He was not tripped or pushed. He just fainted. Other passengers tried to help him but his pulse was already weak. Rochman was rushed to the airport's clinic, but shortly after he was pronounced dead," Augustinus said.

The postmortem results showed he had died of natural causes.

"There are no signs of bruises or blood stains. We have notified the family through the Malaysian embassy," he added. (41/edt)