One killed, two injured in prison brawl

One killed, two injured in prison brawl

Multa Fidrus, The Jakarta Post, Tangerang

One inmate was killed and two others were severely injured in
a mass brawl at the Tangerang Youth Detention Center on Wednesday
afternoon.

The detention center's warden, Sugeng Paulus, said the fatal
brawl involved inmates from Block D and Block F of the facility.

He said the detention center had received 49 inmates from
Selemba Penitentiary on Oct. 30. Half of those prisoners had been
placed in Block D, which was occupied by many inmates, known as
the west gang, from Tangerang, Serang and Rangkas Bitung. The
other inmates were put in Block F, which was mostly occupied by
inmates, known as the north gang, from North Jakarta.

Nana Suryana, an inmate from Salemba who was serving a 10-
month jail sentence for stealing a container, refused to be
placed in Block D even though he was born in Rangkas Bitung.

"Nana's refusal offended a lot of the inmates in Block D and
he was mobbed for it," Sugeng said.

He said prisoners from Block F rushed to his aid, and inmates
from both blocks were soon fighting.

Meanwhile, Tangerang District Police chief Insp. Sumanto
identified the dead victim as M. Yusuf, a resident of Jl. Pintu
Air III/28, Central Jakarta, who was transferred from Salemba
Penitentiary on Oct. 1 and was serving a three-year jail term for
a drug offense.

The injured inmates were Nana Suryana and Imron bin Mursa,
alias Oyon, who was serving a two-year jail term also for a drug
offense.

Head of security at the detention center Raja Grand Syahputra
denied that M. Yusuf was killed in the brawl, saying that the
victim died from tuberculosis.

He complained that the detention center had a capacity of only
600 inmates but was currently housing 817 prisoners.