Victim in hotel murder may have been raped

JAKARTA (JP): The Malaysian businessman charged with killing a local woman in a five-star hotel in Central Jakarta on Monday may have raped the victim before the killing, a police officer said yesterday.

A postmortem examination by the Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital stated that the victim had been a virgin and was raped, a senior detective who asked not to be unidentified told The Jakarta Post.

"The autopsy report reveals that the hymen was torn and there was damage to certain tissue which strongly indicates that she was raped," said the officer.

Police have proven the blood under the victim's fingernails is of the same type of the suspect's.

Earlier police said that Charanjit Dadwall, 26, a Malaysian textile businessman of Indian origin who goes by two other names: Charanjit Singh and Gan Singh, was accused only of the killing.

If found guilty, the Malaysian could serve a maximum of 15 years in prison for the murder and a maximum of 12 years for rape.

According to the source, Dadwall initially told police interrogators varying versions.

During initial police questioning, the newly-married suspect said that he strangled Wati, 26, to death after the victim forced him to pay Rp 1 million (US$440) in cash after they had sex in the hotel room on Monday.

The suspect quoted the victim as saying she was a virgin.

Later the suspect told interrogators that he became enraged when the victim threatened to tell her brother that they had intercourse if he refused to meet her demand to marry her, according to the source.

"He might try to find a strong alibi because police have no more chance to talk with the victim," he said.

"We do have some strong scientific evidence to name him as the main suspect," the source added.

Among the evidence is fingernail scratch marks on Dadwall's face and body, the suspect's blood under the victim's fingernails, his hair on the victim's body and the victim's blood and fingerprints in Dadwall's hotel room.

The officer believed that Wati, who was introduced to the suspect by a friend a few days before she was killed, went to the hotel with the suspect of her own will because she liked the man.

Police preliminary questioning determined that after strangling the woman, Dadwall moved her body to the floor below, near the emergency stairs.

Her body was found by a hotel security guard in the morning while Dadwall was arrested few hours later at a nearby building, where he was to obtain a plane ticket to leave for Kuala Lumpur. (bsr)