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Victim appeared to be unaffected: JIS staffers
The homeroom teacher at the Jakarta International School (JIS) of a six-year-old boy who was allegedly abused by outsourced cleaners claimed that the boy showed no signs of behavioral change caused by trauma during his time there
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he homeroom teacher at the Jakarta International School (JIS) of a six-year-old boy who was allegedly abused by outsourced cleaners claimed that the boy showed no signs of behavioral change caused by trauma during his time there.
Lawyer for two of the cleaners, Patra M. Zen, told reporters on Monday that the homeroom teacher, Neal Murphy, also said during the closed-door trial at the South Jakarta District Court on Monday that the school took photos and videos of all their kindergarten students in order to track their physical and mental development.
The child would have been brought to the school's counsellor if the teachers suspected anything.
'Murphy also said that the victim never complained about any physical pain in his anus or his stomach. He never went to the school's clinic for treatment for any stomach bruises between August last year and March this year,' he said.
Patra added that Murphy told the judges that he had never received any complaints from the victim's parents about their son's condition.
Murphy testified at the hearing of five defendants ' Afrischa Setyani, Virgiawan Amin, Zainal Abidin, Syahrial and Agun Iskandar ' who stand accused of having sexually abused the victim twice in a rest room at JIS, once in January and once in February. All were employed by PT Integrated Service Solutions.
- Victim's teacher and teacher's assistant testify they noticed no changes in boy's behavior after alleged assault
- Previously, child psychologist Seto Mulyadi and victim's grandmother testified that child was clearly traumatized
Murphy had been summoned twice before but failed to appear on either occasion.
Murphy declined to comment on his testimony after the hearing ended but told The Jakarta Post that he missed the trial hearings in the past two weeks because the address on the prosecutor's summons was unclear both times.
'The first letter was apparently sent back to the post office on Jl. RS Fatmawati [South Jakarta]. The second letter's address was still unclear but it was at least addressed to JIS. It arrived on Tuesday [the hearing had been on Monday],' he said.
The boy's teacher assistant, Luciana Christina, also testified at court on Monday after Murphy. According to Patra, both Luciana and Murphy claimed that the kindergarten students were constantly under supervision during school hours.
'Both said that students would be out of their sight for no more than five minutes before either one of them would go look for the child. The teachers would go looking for the students as soon as they realized anyone was missing,' he said.
Furthermore, he explained that both teachers told the judges that their students would go to the rest room by themselves because JIS encouraged independence in their students.
Patra said their statement supported a comment child psychologist Seto Mulyadi said in court during his testimony in October.
'Last time Seto told the judges that the abused child would probably try to avoid the place he was abused in but both Murphy and Luciana said the victim had no problem going to the rest room alone up to the very last day he was at the school,' he said.
During the hearing, both Murphy and Luciana said that neither of them had heard complaints about the five suspects from teachers, students or parents during the time they worked at the school. 'We have asked the prosecutors to summon the victim on Wednesday to testify again. This time he will be testifying via video link,' Patra said.
Three weeks ago, Seto told reporters outside the courtroom after testifying in the trial that after three therapy sessions with the victim, he could conclude that the child was clearly abused.
Early last month, the grandmother of the boy, who flew from the Netherlands, also testified that her grandson appeared to be clearly traumatized.
