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Police focus investigation to nab Beng Seng assailants

Police focus investigation to nab Beng Seng assailants

JAKARTA (JP): The City Police Crime Investigation Directorate is focusing its investigation on the four men who killed an entertainment businessman with reputed mob connections, Nyo Beng Seng, in the hope that it will lead them to who was behind the killing.

"We believe that if we can arrest one of the gang members, we'll certainly be able to find out the man behind the killing," Lt. Col. Timbul Silaen, secretary to the directorate, told reporters yesterday.

According to Timbul, the investigators can't expect a confession from any suspects without hard facts to back them up.

"Let's, for example, name the perpetrator as A Lay. He might come to us but simply tell us that he had nothing to do with the murder. So, we would get nothing," he said.

Beng Seng, alias Darmansyah Suyadi, 57, was stabbed to death at 2 a.m. on April 15 by a group of at least four masked men in the yard of his second wife's mansion on Jl. Pluit Kencana Raya 128, North Jakarta.

Minutes before he died, the victim told his second wife, Tuti, that the plotters of his killing were A Lay and Hong Lie.

A Lay flew to Jakarta from Singapore on Wednesday and told Penjaringan police subprecinct, which is handling the case, that he had nothing to do with the murder.

Sources said that Hong Lie, believed to be A Lay's boss, is still in Hong Kong.

Both people are prominent figures in the illegal gambling dens here and for Indonesian gamblers overseas.

When asked about the possible roles of the two in the killing, City Police Chief Maj. Gen. Mochammad Hindarto commented: "We police always carry out our work based on the presumption of innocence. We could only name people suspects after we found evidence of their involvement."

Hindarto said that he has instructed his personnel to keep on searching, collecting and studying all the information and material evidence relating to the death of Beng Seng.

According to Timbul, the police are still in the dark to find out the suspects along with the motives of Beng Seng's killing.

Besides being widely known as the owner of the Irama Tara cassette and video recording firm, Beng Seng also owned a number of nightclubs, massage parlors and beauty salons. He is also believed to have run several gambling dens here and overseas. (bsr)

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