Obscene callers told their victims to do fatal acts

Obscene callers told their victims to do fatal acts

JAKARTA (JP): Three of the 60 junior high school students who
were victims of obscene and threatening phone calls early last
month said on Tuesday that the callers also ordered them to
perform fatal acts.

Speaking to The Jakarta Post, the students said that the
callers, whose identities remain a mystery, ordered the teenage
victims to electrocute themselves and drink insecticide.

However, none of the students followed the lethal orders.

"I did not drink it (insecticide). But I did everything else
she (the caller) asked me to do, including sticking a needle in
the skin of my penis, tying rubber-bands around my penis and
putting glue on my penis," Amir (not his real name), one of the
victims, said.

He said the caller identified herself as Ibu Etty, Amir's
teacher at the school for religious affairs he attends.

Another student, Eddie (not his real name), said the caller,
who claimed to be his language teacher Ibu Nurhayati Lubis, asked
him to tie a tape recorder cord around his penis and plug the
cord into a wall socket.

"Of course I didn't want to follow that kind of order. The
woman also wanted me to apply glue to my penis and tie rubber-
bands around it. I didn't do any of those things either," Eddie
said.

He recalled that the caller had a very loud voice which seemed
to be of Batak origin.

"But she was sweet to me even when she called me a liar after
I refused to follow her orders," Eddie said.

The same female caller also called another student, Jason (not
his real name).

"She told me to poke the tip of a pencil into the hole of my
penis. But I disobeyed the order because it was impossible for me
to believe that Ibu Lubis would ask me to do such a thing. I then
told my parents everything," Jason said.

Jason said that he did follow the callers command to apply
glue to his penis.

The three students are from SMP 49 in East Jakarta.

As reported late last week, some 60 students from SMP 49 and
SMP 68 in South Jakarta were ordered by unidentified callers to
mutilate their genitals and perform other dangerous sexual acts.

The orders were accompanied by the threat of demotion from
their grade unless they complied.

Most of the students suffered minor injuries to their genitals
after obeying the commands. Schoolboys were told to tie rubber
bands around their penises or to put glue on their penises.
Schoolgirls were ordered to poke the outer parts of their vaginas
with needles or pins.

None of the students from SMP 68 were willing to comment on
the incidents.

According to Bambang Noegroho, deputy principal at SMP 49, the
unidentified callers began making the calls during the first week
of February.

"At least two students stuck pencils up their anuses. Almost
all of the students I interviewed were told to use pencils, pens,
rubber bands, rulers, wires and glue," Bambang said.

He added that the teachers who the callers claimed to be
either sick or out of town when the calls were made.

"Ibu Etty, for example, was seriously ill in a hospital and
could not get out of bed. Ibu Lubis was in Bandung," he said.

Ibu Diana Abdullah, an English teacher at SMP 49 whose name
was also used by the callers, said that she was at Soekarno-Hatta
International Airport on Feb. 12, the day the callers used her
name, with her sister, who was leaving for Amsterdam.

"My other sister, who is a doctor, was also with me at the
airport," said Diana, who has been a teacher for 19 years.

Bambang said that the callers seemed to know which teachers
"could not be reached" if students or students' parents wanted to
"double check".

Psychologist Tika Bisono urged students and their parents to
write down the time of any future threatening telephone calls
they receive.

"Based on that data, the parents could ask PT Telkom to find
out the phone number of the caller," she said.

"What's funny to me is that until now the schools themselves
have not called Telkom to check where those calls originated
from," she added.

Psychiatrist Dadang Hawari and psychologists Gagan Hartana and
Joy Mangowal on Friday labeled the callers psychopaths. (ylt)