Mutilated body disposer only a courier: Police

TANGERANG (JP): Police said yesterday they strongly believe that the man who disposed of a mutilated female body on Sunday was just a courier hired by the murderer to dump the limbs.

Tangerang Police chief Lt. Col. Aryanto Boedihardjo told the media that the killer must have had a special relationship with the victim and that the dismemberment of her body, which was cut into 12 parts, might well have taken place far away from the dumping site.

According to Aryanto, the body parts, which were packed in three cardboard boxes, were taken by the hired courier by train to the Cisauk railway station in Serpong, West Java.

"It would have been almost impossible for him (the courier) to carry the boxes, weighing 25 kilograms, from any nearby streets because the closest one is 400 meters away from the site (where he asked a local teenager to dump the boxes)," the officer said.

The Cisauk railway station, however, is only about 50 meters from the location, Aryanto, who has set up a special team of six police detectives to probe the case, said.

Based on preliminary inquiries, the courier stopped for a drink at a canteen at the station.

He then carried the boxes for 20 meters before he met a teenager, later identified as Dede Hermanto, 15, and gave him a Rp 10,000 (70 U.S. cents) note and a pack of cigarettes to dispose of the boxes.

After that, the man walked back to the station, leaving the startled boy and his two friends in horror after they learned the contents of the boxes, Aryanto said.

"The crime was carefully planned by the killer, who might have known that the quiet dumping site was good for his mission," he said.

By dismembering the victim and hiring a third person to dump the body parts, the killer could then cover his own tracks and render his victim unidentifiable.

"But I promise to solve this case as soon as possible," Aryanto promised.

Besides a saw, a pair of jeans and T-shirt, police also said yesterday that they have found a pencil, an eraser and a small rubber ball used to play jacks among the body parts in the boxes.

The head of the Tangerang police detectives, Capt. Krisnadi, said he hoped the items could help the police with their investigation.

At least four families with missing female relatives visited the Tangerang Police precinct yesterday in a bid to identify the victim from the pictures of the body and evidence found in the boxes.

Krisnadi suggested people who have missing female relatives bring the missing person's identity card, which has their fingerprints on it, to the police station.

On Monday forensic expert Zulhasmar Syamsu of Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital called the killer a psychopath with a professional's knowledge of how to dismember a body.

According to Zulhasmar, the boxes contained the woman's head, arms, thighs, feet, four pieces of flesh from her stomach and breasts and bits of her small intestines, large intestines and stomach.

The incisions were made in the woman's neck and her joints. Her digestive organs were removed.

Stretch marks on her stomach indicated the woman, who was between 25 and 30 years old, had been pregnant during her life.

Aryanto agreed with Zulhasmar's preliminary conclusion that the murderer has a professional's knowledge of slaughtering but dismissed suggestions that the killer is a medical expert.

Zulhasmar said the killer appeared to have used a large knife, usually used in slaughterhouses, to cut up the body. (bsr/41)