Marsinah case may reopen: Expert

JAKARTA (JP): The case of a woman laborer allegedly murdered by military officers in 1993 may be reopened if new evidence comes out in an ongoing investigation, criminal law expert Loebby Loqman said on Monday.

Although a verdict has already been given, a criminal case can be reopened as long as there is new evidence that can be used in a retrial, Loebby said at a seminar on the controversial Marsinah case.

"This case has solid grounds to be reopened," Loebby told The Jakarta Post. He pointed out, however, that the reopening of the case depends greatly on how the police investigation proceeds.

Labor activist Marsinah died on May 8, 1993, in Nganjuk, East Java. Her badly mutilated body was found in a forest not long after she had led a labor strike.

In 1994 the Supreme Court acquitted the eight people who had been convicted by the Surabaya District Court for Marsinah's murder. But in July 1998, police restarted their investigation by questioning 26 witnesses following public pressure to reopen the Marsinah case.

Former attorney general Suhadibroto concluded that the Marsinah trial was handled unprofessionally and resulted in the release of all suspects.

"The intervention of the armed forces obviously influenced, if not hampered, the fairness of the process of police investigations," he told participants at the seminar on Monday.

Another speaker, forensic expert Mun'im Idries, said the postmortem examination on Marsinah's remains was done improperly as it was carried out by doctors who did not how to do an autopsy.

The seminar was organized by Ratna Sarumpaet, a woman playwright who has staged Song from the Underworld, a play depicting Marsinah's struggle for justice and her protests during her journey in the netherworld.

Ratna said the seminar aimed to introduce a new method of unraveling a case through a people's trial, which would allow for the public's distrust of the Indonesian legal system.

"We chose the Marsinah case because it is a case which has the most evidence but which nevertheless has not been completely solved," she said, adding that conclusions reached in the seminar will be presented to the National Police chief in the near future. (04)