T

he National Police have demanded that the budget for criminal-case investigations be increased to Rp 1.15 trillion (US$92.4 million) this year in order to avoid foul play by police personnel.

National Police chief Gen. Sutarman said recently that the 2014 investigation budget of Rp 904 billion only covered costs for 86,842 criminal cases.

'€œHowever, the National Police were able to solve 281,983 criminal cases out of 499,085 cases reported throughout 2014,'€ he said at the National Police headquarters in South Jakarta.

Although Sutarman said that the National Police always tried to be efficient with funds during investigations, the large number of cases solved meant there were probably officers who funded parts of investigations out of their own pockets or pressured those who reported the cases for financial support.

'€œThis means that some cases were solved without state funds,'€ he said.

Sutarman added he was worried that the numbers meant investigators might have been using funds from illicit sources to help solve some cases.

Similarly in 2013, the National Police had an investigation budget of Rp 933 billion, which would have been enough to complete only 89,623 cases. However, they were able to solve 181,738 out of 304,354 cases reported that year.

Although the number of cases solved without using the allocated budget was worrying, Sutarman said he was glad to see that the number of cases solved since 2013 had increased by 55.2 percent last year.