Puteh well, behind bars in Salemba Penitentiary

Puteh well, behind bars in Salemba Penitentiary

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Prosecutors finally managed to put graft convict Abdullah Puteh
behind bars on Thursday after receiving a letter of examination
from a hospital stating the Aceh governor was fit and well after
all.

Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) prosecutors picked up
Puteh from MH Thamrin Hospital, where he had been treated for a
heart condition, and delivered the prisoner to the Salemba
Penitentiary to serve his jail term.

Found guilty of embezzling money spent in the 2001 purchase of
a Russian-made MI-2 helicopter, which caused Rp 3.6 billion
(US$400,800) in losses to the state, Puteh was sentenced to 10
years' jail by the Anticorruption Court.

He was also ordered to pay Rp 500 million in fines and Rp 1
billion in compensation to the government.

KPK prosecutor Khaidir Kamli said the move to jail Puteh was
taken after the commission received health examination results
from the Harapan Kita Hospital clearly stating that Puteh did not
have to be hospitalized.

The KPK requested a second opinion from the hospital, which it
compared with an earlier letter produced by a team of doctors at
the MH Thamrin Hospital, led by Asnath Savitri, stating that
Puteh needed intensive hospital treatment due to his severe heart
condition.

It was this letter that Puteh and his lawyers used as an
excuse to stop prosecutors from taking Puteh from the hospital on
Tuesday, which should have been his first day in prison.

"There is a defection in one of (Puteh's) coronary veins, but
there is no need for any invasive intervention," Khaidir said.

A team of doctors from the Harapan Kita hospital, comprising
of six doctors led by cardiologist Otte J. Rachman, had been
examining dossiers on Puteh's condition during treatment at the
MH Thamrin Hospital.

Lawyer OC Kaligis representing Puteh said he objected to the
execution, claiming the verdict was still not legally binding as
his client was on appeal to the Supreme Court.

"We object to this arbitrary execution. My client will not
sign the execution letter," Kaligis said while accompanying his
client.

Clad in a white T-shirt and black trousers, Puteh, a close
aide of former president Megawati Soekarnoputri, remained silent
despite the flood of questions asked by dozens of journalists who
packed the MH Thamrin hospital.

Kaligis said he would inform the Supreme Court that his client
had been jailed.

Thursday night will be the first night Puteh spends in jail
for many months after a court allowed him to serve city arrest in
Jakarta after his lawyers claimed he was too sick for prison.

The case came back into the spotlight in the past two weeks
when Puteh's lawyer Tengku Syaifudin Popon was caught red-handed
by KPK investigators paying a Rp 250 million bribe to a Jakarta
High Court clerk in what appeared to be an attempt to influence
the appeals court.

Puteh was the first high-level official to be found guilty for
corruption in President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's term, after
he launched a widespread antigraft campaign when he took office
in November last year.