Police apprehend local cyber-pimps
Police apprehend local cyber-pimps
Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The police have arrested a husband and wife who were allegedly
operating a prostitution ring over the Internet for the past two
months.
Ramdoni alias Rino and Yanti Sari alias Bela opened a website
called the Rino Massage Club on the world wide web to offer sex
escorts for between Rp 2 million and Rp 4 million for three hours
of service.
"We arrested them yesterday evening (Thursday evening) at a
hotel in South Jakarta after our officers ordered the sex escort
services in an undercover operation," said the director of the
city detective for special crimes division, Sr. Comr. Edmon
Ilyas.
The couple employed some 20 female sex workers whose pictures
and detailed information were uploaded to the Rino Massage Club
homepage.
"They have been running the prostitution via the Internet for
two months. However, they seem to have been in the prostitution
business for the last two years," said Edmon.
Ramdoni and Yanti usually took a 40 percent cut and the sex
workers took the remaining 60 percent from every payment the
girls got from their customers, Edmon added.
Along with the nabbed pair, the police also confiscated the
hard disc on their computer where the homepage was stored,
payment receipts and over Rp 1 million in cash.
In another development, police have finished the dossiers for
several pornography cases against four tabloids and a daily after
receiving complaints lodged by several witnesses.
"We'll take (legal) action against those tabloids and
newspapers which have allegedly disseminated pornographic
materials. We just don't want the public to think that we've done
nothing to deal with it (pornography)," said Jakarta Police
spokesman Sr. Comr. Prasetyo.
Some of the editors of the allegedly pornographic
publications, have been summoned as suspects in the cases.
Those suspects are Tasmi P.S., chief editor of Lipstik, Nanang
H, chief editor of Hallo Sayang, Irwan, chief editor of newspaper
Lampu Merah, Nikita Kinamura, chief of Bom, Ipung, chief editor
of tabloid Pria Pop, and Rully, chief editor of the tabloid Hot.
"We have completed the dossiers on Hallo Sayang and Lampu
Merah, while finishing three other dossiers," said Prasetyo.
Hallo Sayang and Lampu Merah were reported by actress Sarah
Azhari, after they ran nude photos and a story of Sarah who was
clandestinely photographed in the Budi Han studio dressing room.
Prasetyo said police had taken testimonies from several
experts, including a media expert, a language expert, and from
the Indonesian Ulemas Council (MUI).