'Tempo' lawyers want Tomy to stand trial for perjury
M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Defense lawyers of Tempo magazine told the court on Monday to order the prosecution of tycoon Tomy Winata for perjury in the earlier hearing of the libel case in which three of the weekly's journalists were defendants.
Lawyer Trimoelja D. Soerjadi pointed out that the latest evidence presented in the hearing on Monday at the Central Jakarta District Court contradicts Tomy's earlier statement that he had never been interviewed by a Tempo journalist.
Reporter Veronica Bernarda Rurit testified before the court that she had interviewed Tomy for a news report titled "Is Tomy in Tenabang?", which was published in the weekly's March 3-9, 2003 edition.
"Two managing editors of Tempo told the court that Rurit was assigned to interview Tomy. It was also confirmed by a recording of a telephone interview provided by state-owned telecommunication company PT Telkom," Trimoelja later told The Jakarta Post.
Tomy earlier said in the trial that he had never been interviewed by a Tempo journalists for the article and when a recording of the interview was played in the courtroom, he said that the voice might not be his and its authenticity needed to be proven.
Tempo weekly chief editor Bambang Harymurti, journalists Ahmad Taufik and T. Iskandar Ali were brought to court for violating Articles 310 and 311 of the Criminal Code on defamation. If found guilty, they could be sentenced to four years in prison.
The three were brought to court after a complaint from Tomy who deplored the article, saying that it had tarnished his image as a respectable businessman.
Trimoelja said that Tomy could be charged with perjury under Article 242 of the Criminal Code, an offense that carries a maximum sentence of seven years in prison.
"And if our clients ended up being handed down a more severe punishment due to the false testimony, the prison term could go up to nine years," he said, quoting the article.
The defense have petitioned the judicial panel to order state prosecutors to file a lawsuit against Tomy.