Two girls die from abuse

JAKARTA (JP): Police have arrested the alleged murderer of a teenage girl at the state-developed Harapan Baru housing complex in West Bekasi and are still searching for the suspect or suspects in the murder of a woman in the Margahayu area, East Bekasi.

Bekasi Police detectives arrested Edi, 20, a resident of a village adjacent to the Harapan Baru housing complex, hours after the murder on Monday night. An accomplice in the murder is still at large.

The officers caught Edi as they followed trained police dogs to his house. The culprit did not resist arrest.

The victim, Sunarti, 14, was a resident of the housing complex. She was repeatedly stabbed by a kitchen knife at her aunt's house where she had stayed for almost one year.

A postmortem examination showed stabbed wounds to her chest, arms, ribs, hip and her back, and an abrasion on her vagina.

A relative, Suprapto, said the house owner, Sutarmi, heard Sunarti screaming and asking for help at about midnight on Monday.

"But she was too scared to leave her room. She couldn't even get to the phone.

"Her husband was out of town at the time, leaving only Sutarmi and their five-year-old daughter Lusi," Suprapto quoted Sutarmi as saying at the morgue.

An officer of the West Bekasi Police said the culprits entered the house through a ventilation shaft at the back of the house.

"We are still searching for the motive of the murder as nothing has been taken from the house," the officer said.

Separately, an unidentified woman was found dead at her rented house on Jl. Karang Kitri in the Margahayu area, East Bekasi, on Sunday evening. She suffered a stab wound to her right abdomen and had wounds covering her face.

The victim, estimated to be 27 years old, was taken to Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital's morgue in Central Jakarta by police for further examination after being tipped by residents about an unpleasant smell coming from the house. A postmortem examination revealed abrasion wounds to her vagina and anus.

The woman was 1.45 meters in height, with long, straight black hair and had a light complexion. The victim wore red-and-white shorts and a black T-shirt. (01)