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View all search resultsMissing South Jakarta boy found dead after viral outcry
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Illustration of child abduction. (Courtesy of /Shutterstock)
A
fter eight months with no progress, the disappearance of six-year-old AKN in Pesanggrahan, South Jakarta, finally saw a breakthrough, only after the case went viral, culminating in the arrest of his stepfather last week, who later died by suicide in police custody.
According to Jakarta Police, the boy was found as a skeleton on the banks of the Cilalay River in Tenjo, Bogor Regency, West Java, some 40 kilometers from where he was last seen in Pesanggrahan on March 6.
AKN’s remains were discovered among a pile of trash on Sunday with the help of sniffer dogs, alongside a long-sleeved white shirt and shorts believed to be his. Two days before the discovery, police had arrested the boy’s stepfather, Alex Iskandar, after gathering witness statements and conducting a formal case review.
Although the boy’s family reported him missing shortly after his disappearance in March, police were only able to crack the case this month, following the viral abduction case of a four-year-old girl identified as B, who was allegedly a victim of child trafficking. B was abducted in Makassar, South Sulawesi, and later found in Jambi, Sumatra, more than 2,000 kilometers west of Makassar, after being passed between multiple parties.
“We have interrogated [Alex] but he denied any involvement during our earlier questioning [after the family report],” Jakarta Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Budi Hermanto said during a press conference on Monday.
“But after conducting a deeper investigation involving more than 20 witnesses, we obtained enough information to name him a suspect,” he added.
Read also: Parents step up vigilance amid spike in child abductions
