Rights commission wants Marsinah case reopened

Rights commission wants Marsinah case reopened

JAKARTA (JP): The National Commission on Human Rights urged
the police yesterday to reopen the file on the murder of labor
activist Marsinah following the high court decision to acquit a
man earlier thought to have masterminded the killing.

The commission's Secretary-General, Baharuddin Lopa, said the
police should reopen the Marsinah case file in order to find the
murderer.

The Surabaya High Court last month overturned the guilty
verdict meted out by a district court to Judi Susanto, the owner
of the watchmaking company where Marsinah was working at the time
of her brutal demise.

Her torture and murder in May last year sparked an outcry from
labor and human rights activists. The entire legal process, from
arrest and interrogation to the subsequent trial of Judi and
eight of his staff, all of whom were charged with responsibility
for her killing, was wrought with controversy.

All nine were convicted for conspiracy, with Judi receiving
the stiffest penalty of 17 years in jail for masterminding the
murder. Ironically, as Judi went free due to the acquittal, the
same court upheld the guilty verdict against another defendant,
Yudi Astono, and reaffirmed his four-year jail term.

Speaking during a law seminar, Lopa yesterday said that he was
sure that Judi, as well as the other defendants, were victims of
a frame-up designed to make them take the rap for the murder
committed by others.

Loebby Loqman, a professor of criminal law from the University
of Indonesia, suggested that police search for her actual killers
instead of wasting time looking for more evidence to support the
allegations against Judi.

"He has been released, which means that there must be somebody
else who committed the murder," Loebby said.

The two men made the remarks in a seminar organized by the
Forum Keadilan biweekly and the Indonesian Judges' Association
(Ikahi).

The National Commission of Human Rights, responding to
requests from the defendants' lawyers, sent a team to investigate
allegations of torture and human rights abuses by the police and
the military in extracting incriminating statements from them.

The commission came up with a report saying that there were
indications that the alleged actions did take place and urged the
concerned authorities to respond to the report. The team, which
was led by Lopa, suggested the possibility that the murder was
committed by people other than the defendants.

He said he was not happy with the police response that the
commission should conduct the investigation itself.

"The human rights commission members are not investigators. If
the commission carries out an investigation, what is the use of
police and prosecutors?" Lopa, a former prosecutor, asked.

Lopa went public yesterday with some of the commission's
findings, which had not been disclosed previously.

During its inquiry, the commission determined that Judi had
been tortured and that from the beginning of the investigation,
the police had "hidden" Judi's two housemaids, who acted as the
key witnesses in the case, Lopa said. It was the maids who
testified that Judi had led a meeting in the house to plan the
murder of Marsinah.

"What was the use of hiding them?" Lopa said.

Another irregularity found by the commission was the fact that
Marsinah's clothes had been burned. "Why did they burn them?" he
asked, without speculating openly about who had burned the
clothes.

The commission also discovered problems with the visum et
repertum autopsy document.

Lopa said that altogether the commission found seven pieces of
evidence to back its conclusion that Marsinah was killed by a
person or persons other than the defendants.

Marsinah, a high school graduate, was actively involved in a
series of protests, demanding improvement in working conditions
at the company, including a raise in the workers' daily wages
from Rp 1,700 to Rp 2,250.

The deceased activist was granted a posthumous Yap Thiam Hien
human rights award from the Foundation for the Human Rights Study
Center last year for her struggle for labor rights.

This year's award will be presented to Judi's lawyer,
Trimoelya D. Soerjadi, on Saturday. (sim)