Buleleng police disclosed Tuesday that five local teenagers had alleged during police questioning that they had been sexually molested by an Australian national.
The accused Australian national was identified as Grandfield Philip Robert, a 61-year old retired accountant, who has resided in Bali for ten years. He was known as Philip to local youths.
His lawyer, who has filed a report against the boys for blackmail, said the youths, aged 16 to 19, had voluntarily come to Robert's home in Singaraja.
Minors are children aged up to 18 according to the 2002 law on child protection. The police had taken Robert into custody on Saturday following a report filed by two local youths, both 18-year-old students at a private senior high school in Singaraja.
"We detained the suspect in response to the report," Buleleng police spokesperson Comr. Made Sudirsa said.
Police later questioned three more teenagers, who told police they had also been molested.
Sudirsa said all the teenagers were under police protection.
The police planned to question three more suspected victims.
Sudirsa also said the first five boys had voluntarily visited Philip's house on Jl. Tasbih in Singaraja.
"They acknowledged that they all came to the house initially to play pool," he said.
"Then, after finishing the game, they were asked by the suspect to watch some porn movies before they ended up in the bedroom."
He added the youngsters had admitted to having been paid from Rp 25,000 to Rp 50,000 (US$2.74 to $5.49) for sexual intercourse.
Robert's lawyer Ketut Suartana insisted his client had never forced the teenagers to come into his house and that the boys had not refused the money Robert gave them.
According to Robert's statement, all the teenagers are actually male prostitutes who are trying to blackmail him, motivated by jealousy," he told The Jakarta Post.
"So this is not a pedophile case as currently depicted by the local mass media," Suartana said.
He said according to Robert's statement, the teenagers had initially asked his client for several things, including money for school tuition fees and for liquor.
When Robert refused, the lawyer said, "they started threatening my client."
Sudirsa, the police spokesman, said the police still had a strong case regarding the minors even though sex was proven to be consensual.
Bali has experienced several pedophile cases involving foreigners in the past. Australian William Stuart Brown, for example, was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 2004, while Frenchman Michelle Rene Heller was sentenced to three years in jail in 2005.
