Police hand over Tampubolon dossiers to prosecutor's office

Police hand over Tampubolon dossiers to prosecutor's office

JP/3/Bolon/0

Police hand over Tampubolon dossiers to prosecutor's office

JAKARTA (JP): Police delivered their dossiers on the four men
accused of killing General Tampubolon to the district
prosecutors' office yesterday.

"We handed it over to the prosecutors' office this morning,"
said chief of the East Jakarta police precinct, Lt. Col. Susmono
Soesilo.

In a related development, City Police chief Maj. Gen.
Mochammad Hindarto said that three -- not two as released earlier
-- of the four are believed to have stabbed Brig. Gen. Toga
Manahan Franklin, 54, after some sort of altercation on Jl. Griya
Wartawan in East Jakarta at around 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.

"We hope that the prosecutor's office process the dossiers
immediately so that they be sent to the district court," Susmono
said.

Imprisonment

Based on Article 338 of the criminal code, a murderer faces a
maximum sentence of 15 years.

The four, who were 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 private 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 told The Jakarta Post yesterday that Lukman, a local ojek
(motorcycle taxi) driver, was the one who helped his friends but
did not use a knife.

Rudiyanto is therefore believed to have used the knife on
Tampubolon.

The source, who asked to be unnamed, said that the quick
completion of the dossiers also indicates that there are no
hidden motives behind the killing and that no other parties were
involved in the murder as asserted by many.

"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.

Hearing their shouts, the general turned his car back and
questioned the group about their motives, which then escalated
into a heated argument and ultimately the killing.

The killing occurred at around 10 p.m. Monday, about five
minutes after Tampubolon received a call from an unidentified
party and hurriedly left his house at the nearby Army housing
complex. (bsr)