School final exam trial takes unexpected turn

JAKARTA (JP): The trial on the leakage of national high school final examinations (Ebtanas) master copies took an unexpected turn on Monday, when a witness denied claims that her jealousy of a colleague had led her to order defendant Dwi Santoso to steal the copies on March 30, this year.

"What Dwi has told (the police) is not true. I never ordered the defendant to steal Ebtanas copies, for any reason," witness Yeni Daryani said while Dwi stared at her defiantly at a Central Jakarta District Court hearing, presided over by judge M. Daning Sunusi.

The papers were allegedly leaked by the defendant, who had worked for about three years as an office boy at the Directorate General of Elementary and Secondary Education (Dikdasmen), the Ministry of National Education.

The three-day examination for high school students were held from May 22 until May 24.

Defense lawyer Soejoed told Yeni, a committee member for the Ebtanas Project, that the defendant had told police detectives that Yeni had been "very jealous" of witness Sri Yudiani, subdivision head of systems and procedures at Dikdasmen, because Sri had been awarded a position which Yeni had long coveted.

The defendant, Soejoed said, told the police that Yeni knew that Sri had been given partial responsibility for taking care of the conference room on the Dikdasmen building's fifth floor, where the master copies of the examination papers were kept in a safe.

"So, Dwi said you decided to tarnish Sri's reputation, and got Dwi to steal the master copies," Soejoed said, to the vehement denial of Yeni.

"That's just not true!" Yeni said.

Asked whether the police had ever questioned her as a suspect in the case, Yeni said: "Yes, but those dossiers have not been processed by the police."

Yeni also said that the only time Dwi had ever visited her home, was with his girlfriend, on April 2 this year.

"That day, a staff member was getting married, and he and his girlfriend, wanted to hitch a ride to the wedding ceremony," Yeni said.

Dwi has been accused by prosecutor So'imah of violating Article 362 of the Criminal Code on stealing and Article 322 of the same Code on deliberately revealing confidential information gained by virtue of one's employment.

Article 362 carries a maximum punishment of five years in jail, while Article 322 carries a maximum punishment of nine months in jail.

Yeni's testimony was, however, different than the one given by Yeni's 18-year-old maidservant, Maemunah.

Despite showing extreme confusion to questions of the judges and prosecutor So'imah, Maemunah confidently said that Dwi had visited Yeni's residence on March 30.

"I opened the door then... he was with his girlfriend," said Maemunah, who is no longer working with Yeni.

Maemunah added that she did not remember Dwi carrying a purple-colored backpack -- which carried copies of the examination papers -- during his visit to Yeni's home on March 30, and she never actually saw him speaking to Yeni.

Dwi in turn, said that he had visited Yeni's residence thrice, namely on March 30, March 31 and April 2.

Yeni told the hearing that she only found out about the leaks when staff members on the fifth floor had been called in for an urgent meeting on May 26 by their boss, Bambang, who informed them that examination copies from box no. 28 in the conference room, had gone missing.

"He specifically told us not to report this matter to the police or anybody else. His exact words were, 'Be careful! Don't speak of this to anybody," Yeni told the hearing.

The story took another unexpected turn, when witness Dwi Suwarno, a staff member in charge of photocopying the examination master copies, told the hearing that Bambang had trusted the defendant to do "the sorting of the top secret" photocopied papers.

Meanwhile, Yeni said that Bambang had trusted the defendant enough to order him to type out the questions of the examination.

Prosecutor So'imah said that on March 30, the defendant had taken the master copies of examination papers in economic studies, sociology, mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology.

"He made copies of them, distributed those copies to students of South Jakarta state high schools -- which were then circulated in East and West Jakarta state high schools, private high schools, and West Java state high schools," she said. (ylt)