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Greater Jakarta: Thamrin bomb victim testifies in hearing
A victim of the 2016 Thamrin terrorist attack, Second Insp
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victim of the 2016 Thamrin terrorist attack, Second Insp. Denny Mahieu, took the witness stand on Friday to testify against the alleged mastermind behind the attack, Aman Abdurrahman.
Denny said he had been inspecting a traffic police post when the first of several explosions rocked the Central Jakarta area on Jan. 14, 2016. The attack on Jl. MH Thamrin, which also included a shoot-out between the assailants and police, left eight people dead and some 20 others injured, including Denny.
Five of the eight fatalities were terrorists.
Denny told the South Jakarta District Court that he had been patrolling the area on his motorcycle when he noticed the door to the traffic police post was open and stopped to investigate.
“I decided to check [the post] and I found a bag, two pieces of cake, two boxes and two bottles of water,” Denny said during the hearing, which was led by Judge Akhmat Zaini.
About five seconds later, a blast tore through a Starbucks café located across the road, and 30 seconds after that, another bomb exploded inside the post as Denny was attempting to call for back-up.
Denny sustained severe injuries to the right side of his body and was hospitalized for a month after the attack.
During the hearing, Aman’s lawyer, Asludin Hatjani, argued that the officer’s testimony did not prove Aman’s involvement in the bombings.
Aman is a Muslim cleric and a known supporter of the Islamic State (IS) movement.
“We still cannot see the connection of his testimony to the defendant, but he is the first witness. During the bombing, Aman was still in Nusa Kambangan Prison [in Cilacap, Central Java],” Asludin said.
During the case’s first hearing on Feb. 15, prosecutor Anita Dewayani claimed one of Aman’s followers, Saiful Munthohir, visited the cleric in prison in November 2015.
Saiful allegedly told Aman that a caliphate leader in Syria had ordered him to carry out an attack similar to the one in Paris, which had taken place that same month.
Aman, she added, told Saiful to recruit a field coordinator to execute the plan.
