The court also ordered the seizure for the state of Rp 64 billion (US$7.1 million) in the bank accounts of the defendant, his spouse and children.

The police, prosecutors and the judges did not deliberately botch up the case as the corrupt law enforcers at the Tangerang District Court did with a similar case against junior tax auditor Gayus H. Tambunan in early 2010. Gayus is now facing bigger corruption charges only because of the tips provided by former National Police detective chief  Susno Duadji.

In fact, the case against Bahasyim would have turned into another mockery of justice had it not been for the honest panel of judges who, after more than four months of trial, cried foul and publicly reprimanded the team of public prosecutors for “their complete incompetence” because they had delayed three times recommending a sentencing demand for the defendant.

The Internal Control Department of the Attorney General’s Office deserved credit for its quick response by putting the prosecutors under investigation for possible wrongdoing and strengthening the prosecution team.

Alas, preliminary findings by the internal control investigators did discover strong indications of corruption. The prosecutors seemed to have dragged their feet in regard to the sentencing demand for the defendant while waiting for a bigger bribe offer from the defendant. The investigators found that the prosecutors had planned to demand only five years in prison for Bahasyim and did not demand the seizure for the state of the Rp 64 billion in the accounts of the defendant, his wife and children.

The verdict, though much more lenient than what we have expected for such a big corrupt official, should also become a confidence-building block for the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (PPATK), which has thus far been rather frustrated over the acutely tiny number of corruption cases built up from the thousands of suspicious financial transactions it has filed with the police.

The 58-year-old former taxman would have been able to enjoy his ill-gotten wealth after he retired from the tax directorate general in early 2008 had it not been for the alertness on the part of the PPATK, which discovered suspicious transactions worth hundreds of billions of rupiah in the bank accounts of Bahasyim, his wife and his three children between 2005 and 2009.

Bahasyim claimed to have accumulated his wealth cent by cent from skillful investment and the business of his family members, but he was never able to support his claim with audited financial balance sheets of “his businesses”. His annual tax returns simply reflected his modest earnings as a civil servant.

This, we think, is the biggest advantage of the anti-money laundering law in fighting corruption because the burden of proof falls on the defendant, not on the prosecutors as with cases of corruption and other criminal cases.               

Testimony and evidence submitted at court showed how Bahasyim could have amassed more than Rp 64 billion  in financial assets and a similar amount worth of luxury houses and vast tracts of land in Jakarta.   

But, in his official wealth report to the Corruption Eradication Commission — a requirement for all senior officials — Bahasyim disclosed only Rp 10 billion worth of financial and fixed assets.

Hence, even though the court ordered the seizure for the state of the Rp 64 billion in financial assets, Bahasyim and his family are still very rich, with wealth worth millions of dollars. But since Bahasyim will appeal the verdict, corruption watch organizations and the AGO should closely monitor and safeguard the process in the high court and the Supreme Court.

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