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Affiliate of @TrioMacan2000 arrested

The Jakarta Police have arrested a man identified as Edi Saputra, suspected of being affiliated with the administrators of notorious Twitter account @TrioMacan2000, for allegedly extorting an official at state-owned telephone operator PT Telkom Indonesia, public relations vice president Arif Prabowo

Dewanti A. Wardhani (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Thu, October 30, 2014

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Affiliate of @TrioMacan2000 arrested

T

he Jakarta Police have arrested a man identified as Edi Saputra, suspected of being affiliated with the administrators of notorious Twitter account @TrioMacan2000, for allegedly extorting an official at state-owned telephone operator PT Telkom Indonesia, public relations vice president Arif Prabowo.

The @TrioMacan2000 account has been suspended several times and is currently '€œtweeting'€ under the handle @TM2000Back. The account is widely known among Twitter users for its controversial tweets on legal cases implicating government officials.

Most recently, @TM2000Back has been tweeting about alleged corruption by Tourism MinisterArief Yahya, who previously served as Telkom'€™s president director.

Spokesman Sr. Comr. Rikwanto said that Arif had previously reported Edi for defamation to the Jakarta Police and had helped the police arrest Edi.

'€œThe case started when ES [Edi], claiming to be a commissioner at an online media, approached AP [Arif] and offered the latter the chance to put up advertisements at the media where the former worked. ES asked AP to pay up front and AP refused,'€ Rikwanto told reporters at the Jakarta Police headquarters in South Jakarta on Wednesday.

Rikwanto said Edi became angry and spread rumors regarding corruption among Telkom officials on Twitter and sent text messages from several different numbers of links of the tweets to Arif, who reported the incident to the police.

He said that Arif, after consulting the police, contacted Edi to set him up. Edi asked for Rp 50 million (US$4,134) from Arif and in return Edi would stop spreading the rumors. Arif agreed and preparedRp 50 million in cash and sent it to Edi'€™s residence in Tebet, South Jakarta, using a courier.

'€œThe transaction was made Monday night. A few moments after [Edi] received the money, five officers from the Jakarta Police'€™s cyber crime unit came to search his home,'€ Rikwanto said.

The police then arrested Arif and seized Rp 49.65 million, one Samsung smartphone with two SIM cards and one BlackBerry smartphone with one SIM card.

'€œ[Edi] may be charged with Articles 27 and 45 of the ITE Law, as well as Article 368 of the Criminal Code on extortion and Article 310 of the Code on defamation.'€

Articles 27 and 45 of the ITE Law stipulate that anyone found guilty of using electronic media, including social networks, to intimidate or defame others could be liable to six years in prison and a fine of up to
Rp 1 billion.

Meanwhile, @TMBack2000 on Wednesday maintained that Arief Yahya had been involved in corruption during his tenure as Telkom president director and offered a different side to the story.

The account also questioned Edi'€™s arrest, saying that the one who committed graft was the one who should be arrested by the police.

Past cases involving @TrioMacan2000

* Feb. 1, 2013: Head of the National Agency for Placement and Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers (BNP2TKI) Jumhur Hidayat reported @TrioMacan2000 to the police for defamation. @TrioMacan2000 said Jumhur made illicit payments to migrant workers.

* May 16, 2013: Cooperatives and Small and Medium Enterprises Minister Syarifudin Hasan filed a police report against @TrioMacan2000 for defamation after their tweet about his wife.

* June 4, 2014: Jokowi Advanced Social Media Volunteers (Jasmev) reported the Twitter account to the Election Supervisory Board because it often spread smear campaigns against Jokowi.

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