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Jakarta Post

Five cleaners sentenced to lengthy prison terms

The South Jakarta District Court declared Monday that five PT ISS Indonesia cleaners were guilty in a case of child sexual abuse that took place at the Jakarta Intercultural School (JIS) and sentenced them to seven and eight years’ imprisonment, despite defense lawyers’ insistence there was a lack of evidence in the three-page indictment

Indra Budiari (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, December 23, 2014

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Five cleaners sentenced to lengthy prison terms

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he South Jakarta District Court declared Monday that five PT ISS Indonesia cleaners were guilty in a case of child sexual abuse that took place at the Jakarta Intercultural School (JIS) and sentenced them to seven and eight years'€™ imprisonment, despite defense lawyers'€™ insistence there was a lack of evidence in the three-page indictment.

A panel of judges sentenced Virgiawan Amin, Zainal Abidin, Syahrial and Agun Iskandar to eight years'€™ imprisonment, while Afrischa Setyani, the only woman among the five convicts, got seven years as the panel declared that they had violated Article 82 of the Child Protection Law in conjunction with Article 55 of the Criminal Code for collectively and continuously sexually abusing a minor.

The prosecutors demanded 10 years'€™ imprisonment for each of the defendants.

In addition, in the five verdict readings, which were held consecutively for each defendant, the judges also ordered the cleaners to pay Rp 100 million (US$8,038) in fines, which could be substituted by an additional three months in prison.

As their main consideration, the judges said they used testimony from the victim '€” who is now 6 but was 5 years old when he was assaulted '€” who said that he had been assaulted by the cleaners in the school'€™s bathroom, as well as the confessions the cleaners made during interrogations in the Jakarta Police headquarters.

'€œThe judges reject the five defendants'€™ retractions of their confessions of guilt and, therefore, still use them as evidence,'€ Ahmad Yunus, the presiding judge of Afrischa'€™s trial, said at the South Jakarta District Court.

In their defense statements the cleaners had retracted their confessions of guilt because they said that they had been made under torture by police officers during the interrogations and said that, at that moment, they had had no other option but to confess to something that they had not done.

Police claimed that one suspect, Azwar, killed himself with cleaning liquid during his interrogation, while the other four male cleaners testified repeatedly during the trial that they had seen Azwar being beaten severely.

Judge Nelson Sianturi said during the reading of Setiawan'€™s verdict that during previous hearings the boy had consistently pointed his finger to the photos of the cleaners and the judges considered it as solid proof that the five defendants were involved in the abuse.

'€œWe would be aware if the child made up a story, but in this case he pointed at the same photos [of the accused] over and over. It means that the abuse really happened,'€ Nelson said.

The case has been causing controversy since it became public in April 2014, as it also implicated two teaching staff at the city'€™s top international school, with lawyers of the cleaners and teachers continuously claiming that their clients were charged under shaky indictments that used tortured confessions and testimony from a very young victim as the basis.

After the reading of the verdicts, Patra M. Zen, lawyer for Virgiawan and Agun, maintained their innocence and said that he would file an appeal.

Yaya Heriyah, wife of Syahrial, said that she could not believe that her husband had been convicted and added that she hoped the appeals court would free him.

'€œI know my husband, to whom I have been married for seven years, and he is not a child molester. Where is justice when you need it?'€ she asked The Jakarta Post.

Yaya also deplored the Rp 100 million fine and said that the situation was already hard for her and her 3-month-old son because the backbone of the family would be locked up for years.

'€œI really have no idea how to pay the fine,'€ Yaya said before bursting into tears.

The lawyers have pointed out the lack of evidence in the three-page indictment, which consists mostly of the confessions the then-accused made during the police interrogations, which they had retracted. The indictment did not include the results of any medical examinations done on the five convicts to test for herpes.

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