Police chief visits injured woman, asks forgiveness

JAKARTA (JP): A young pregnant woman who was shot in the abdomen on Sunday by a city police detective who mistakenly thought she was a drug supplier was still being treated at Husada hospital on Tuesday.

Jakarta Police chief Maj. Gen. Noegroho Djajoesman and two senior police staff, including Central Jakarta Police chief Lt. Col. Iman Haryatna, visited the 23-year-old victim, Sandra Agustini, on Tuesday and asked her relatives for forgiveness.

Sources at the hospital said the bullet lodged in Sandra's abdomen was removed Monday evening.

"She's fine. Her condition is stable. But she sometimes screams because of the pain she's suffering," one of the nurses said on Tuesday.

The nurse, who asked to remain anonymous, added that doctors could not give any pain killers to the injured woman as this could endanger her three-month-old pregnancy.

Sandra was with her husband late Sunday in the parking lot of the Jayakarta Tower apartments on Jl. Hayam Wuruk in West Jakarta when she was shot by a police detective, who thought the woman was a drug supplier fleeing from a police raid.

Sandra said she thought that she and her husband, Wawan Suhandi, 28, who were leaving the parking lot in their car after having supper in the apartment building, were being ambushed by a gang of armed robbers.

"I decided to leave our car to look for help," Sandra said from her bed in the hospital.

One of the detectives involved in the raid admitted that all of the police were in civilian clothes that night.

They surrounded the couple's Feroza jeep after receiving a tip-off from a man arrested a few minutes earlier in his suite in the same building, in possession of 100 grams of shabu-shabu (crystal metamphetamine) and a revolver with five rubber bullets, the officer said.

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The man, A Hok, 33, had long been suspected of dealing shabu- shabu, added the officer, who requested anonymity.

"While we took him down in the lift, we pushed him to tell us the identities and whereabouts of his suppliers, the officer said.

A Hok apparently told the detectives that his suppliers were waiting in a blue Feroza parked downstairs.

"We then saw two people inside the jeep, but we really had no idea of their sexes," he said.

According to the officer's explanation, the team encircled the car and ordered the two to get out slowly. When the person in the front passenger seat bent over, one of the officers fired shots at the car.

"One of the bullets hit Sandra's abdomen," he recalled.

The officer who fired the shots is a second lieutenant from the narcotics unit and is being interrogated by City Police internal affairs, police sources said.

Sandra's husband, Wawan, said he was at first confused by the sudden appearance of the gunmen but said he had no choice but to follow their instruction to get out of the car.

He said it was not until after his wife was shot that the men identified themselves as police officers.

"Even the officers were shocked when they learned that they had shot a woman," recalled Wawan.

He said he knew nothing about A Hok or his alleged criminal activities.

"I just learned all details of the grave misunderstanding from the officers on our way to the hospital," he said.

Police said they believe A Hok intentionally gave false information to the detectives.

City Police detectives chief Col. Alex Bambang Riatmojo on Monday refused to comment on whether A Hok deserved to be further charged in connection with the incident.

He only said that police had settled the accidental shooting with Sandra's family.

According to Alex, the shooting was mainly caused by the heightened pressure felt by police when dealing with suspected criminals.

Alex added that the revolver found in A Hok's possession made the detectives anxious that his suppliers would also be armed.

"If a mere trader has a gun, his boss must have brought a better automatic gun," he said.

During his visit to the hospital on Tuesday, Maj. Gen. Noegroho told Sandra's family that all the victim's medical bills would be paid by the Jakarta Police, Wawan said.

"Besides asking for forgiveness and giving his word to pay all the bills, Pak Noegroho also told my wife to calm down and said prayers for her health," he said. (emf/bsr)