Police dossiers on Tampubolon case found lacking
JAKARTA (JP): The prosecutor's office announced yesterday that the dossiers on four men accused of killing Brig. Gen. TMF Tampubolon are missing basic information and that they have been returned to the police.
"We handed the dossiers back to the police soon after we received them because we found they were incomplete," prosecutor Bonar Gultom from the Jakarta Prosecutor's Office said, adding that the East Jakarta received the dossiers from the police last week.
Gultom, who is in charge of criminal affairs at the Jakarta prosecutor's office, said the dossiers on the four suspects need review because information essential to the prosecutions case was missing.
Police sources, quick to dispel theories of conspiracy, had claimed the early completion of the dossiers was proof that there was nothing more to the murder than hot tempers and bad timing.
Gultom declined to reveal what was missing, saying it is unethical to give information to the press.
He did say that the dossiers would be divided into three sets of charges, which means the suspects will all face three separate trials.
"We have set up three teams to tackle the case," said Gultom.
Lt. Col. Susmono Soesilo, chief of the East Jakarta police precinct, announced last week that the dossiers had been given to the prosecutors' office.
"We hope that the prosecutor's office process the dossiers immediately so that they be sent to the district court," Susmono said at the time, unaware they were deficient.
City Police chief Maj. Gen. Mochammad Hindarto said that three of the four are believed to have stabbed Tampubolon, 54, after some sort of altercation on Jl. Griya Wartawan in East Jakarta at 10 p.m. on April 6.
"We found another knife hidden inside a septic tank at one of the suspect's hideouts," said Hindarto, adding that this has led the police to conclude that three of the suspects delivered fatal blows.
The three allegedly used a bayonet, a machete and a knife to stab Tampubolon, while the other assisted. Tampubolon was a former group commander for one of the Armed Forces' (ABRI) four elite red beret Kopassus squads.
Tampubolon was stabbed 11 times and died half an hour later at the nearby UKI hospital.
Prison
Based on Article 338 of the criminal code, a murderer faces a maximum sentence of 15 years.
The four, arrested about six and a half hours after the murder, are Rusdi Abdul Rahman, 24, Hendrik Setyawan, 25, Rudiyanto, 24, and Lukman, 30.
Rusdi, a security guard at a house close to the scene, was believed to have stabbed Tampubolon with a bayonet while Hendrik, a construction worker, gashed the general with a machete.
A reliable police source close to the investigation of the case said last week that Lukman, a local ojek (motorcycle taxi) driver, was the one who helped his friends but did not use a knife.
"The killing was purely a common accident where four people walking home from a billiard center shouted hastily and loudly to the driver of a car whom they believed had brushed against them," the source said.
The four were walking at the edge of the narrow road.
According to the police the general heard their curses and turned his car back to confront them. This escalated into a heated argument and ultimately the killing.
The killing occurred at about five minutes after Tampubolon received a call from an unidentified party and hurriedly left his house at the nearby Army housing complex. (09/has)