Progress slow in coming in case against Pemuda Pancasila executives

JAKARTA (JP): City police say they are determined to bring to trial three executives of the Pemuda Pancasila youth organization in connection with the fatal torture and beating of a servant in 1993.

"We are still completing the dossiers and we have no intention of closing the case," City Police Spokesman Lt. Col. Bambang Permantoro told The Jakarta Post yesterday.

Bambang said he agreed that the two years the police have spent completing the dossiers was rather too long a time. He said the delay had been because the suspects were also implicated in other cases.

One of the Pemuda Pancasila executives facing prosecution, Yorrys Raweyai, has challenged the police to bring the case to court as soon as possible so that he can prove that he is innocent.

Yorrys said that the long time taken to complete the dossiers had created uncertainty and misled the public into thinking that the case would be dropped.

Bambang refused to give details as to why it has taken the police two years to complete the dossiers. "But, we'll try to speed up the process," he said.

As a result of the slow completion of the dossiers, Yorrys, the day-to-day chairman of the organization, has said he will sue the police for libel for implicating him in the beating.

"I'm preparing to sue the city police for libel because the police have taken too long to complete dossiers on my case. This hurts my good name and makes me unable to clear my position in court," Yorrys said last week.

According to Yorrys, the police should have completed their dossiers on the September 1993 killing of servant Djasman, aged 23.

The servant is believed to have kidnapped and killed the two- and-a-half year old son of his employer, Cornelius Simandjuntak, the secretary of the North Jakarta branch of Pemuda Pancasila.

The other two suspects are identified as Ruhut Sitompoel, who is a lawyer, and Gunung Hutapea. Both of them are executives of the youth organization.

The servant was strongly suspected of having kidnapped and murdered Simandjuntak's boy in Depok, 30 kilometers south of Jakarta, on Sept. 7, 1993.

The police reported a month after his death that Djasman died in a police hospital from severe injuries that occurred before he was arrested. Police claim that the servant was already seriously wounded and was missing one of his ears when he given into police custody by people who found him in Pasar Minggu. (bsr)