Suspects in bombing case lose suit against police

Suspects in bombing case lose suit against police

JAKARTA (JP): The South Jakarta District Court rejected on
Thursday the lawsuit filed by 22 suspects in the September
bombing at the Jakarta Stock Exchange (JSX) building which
challenged the City Police's manner of arresting them.

Judge Soedarto said the police had lawfully arrested the
suspects accordingly to Article 77 of the Criminal Code
Procedures (KUHAP) on the district court's authority to try a
case and to issue a verdict over the case.

"The arrest was lawful as it had been supported by initial
evidence of their alleged involvement, as stipulated in Article
17 of KUHAP," Soedarto, who is also the court's spokesperson,
said while reading the verdict.

"None of the witnesses have testified in court that the police
had failed to show their warrants. The police also sent the
copies of the warrants to the suspects' families within one day,"
he added.

However, wives of two of the JSX bombing suspects had
testified in a previous court hearing that they only received
copies of the police warrants four days after the arrest.

"The court decided to exclude the testimonies of the two
suspects' wives as they had not been sworn in prior to giving
their testimonies," Soedarto said while reading his legal
argument.

Iwan Setiawan, a suspect in the bombing of the Malaysian
Embassy last August, claimed in his confession that employees at
the Krung Baru Motor car repair station in Ciganjur, South
Jakarta, had planned the bombing of JSX building. This the judge
said was sufficient initial evidence.

The 22 suspects were arrested by police on Sept. 23 at the
Krung Baru Motor car repair shop, owned by Tengku Ismahmudi.

Tengku Ismahmudi and the other 21 suspects, represented by
lawyers of the Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI)
filed a lawsuit against the police with the district court on
Oct. 23.

PBHI lawyer, Johnson Panjaitan, had earlier asked the court to
free the men because their arrest was based on feeble initial
evidence.

Johnson said all of his 22 clients were victims of wrongful
arrest by the police.

He demanded that the police pay Rp 1 million in compensation
for each suspect, issue a public apology and restore their names.

Johnson cited Article 17 of KUHAP which stipulates that a
person could only be arrested if there was sufficient initial
evidence to support the accusation of a criminal offense.

The 22 men, including the owner and the workers of the car
repair shop, many of whom were Acehnese, had rejected the
police's accusation that the JSX bombing was part of a campaign
by the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

Police have also linked the bombing with the grenade attack at
the Malaysian embassy in Jakarta last August.

All of the suspects have denied any role in the bombings,
while GAM has also rejected the allegation of its link to the
bombings.

Police have also arrested two members of the Indonesian
Military in connection with the bombing. Their cases are being
handled separately by a joint police-military investigation team.

Lawyer of the City Police Sr. Insp. Barnabas Iman had earlier
told the court that the confession of one of the suspects had led
to the arrest of the other suspects, including Tengku Ismahmudi,
who is accused of being the mastermind behind the bomb attack.

Only three of the 22 suspects are currently under police
custody. The other 19 suspects were temporarily freed on Oct. 6.

Hendardi, PBHI coordinator, told journalists after Thursday's
hearing that he would not take any legal action against the
court's ruling.

"We could have predicted the verdict from the beginning as the
judge did not substantially examine the initial evidence or our
witnesses' testimonies.

"We have to comply with the court's ruling even though the
court followed the same approach as that taken by the New Order
government," he said. (01)