Paras Indonesia, August, 25 2006 @ 06:55 pm
Will Heads Roll Over Imam Samudra's Laptop?
By: Roy Tupai
The Justice and Human Rights Ministry should be hugely embarrassed by allegations
that death row Bali bomber Imam Samudra used a laptop "smuggled" into his jail cell
to plot a second series of bombings that killed 23 people last year. But so far it's
unclear whether police have found the computer allegedly used by Samudra. What
they have managed to seize is a laptop owned by one of his lawyers that ended up in
the hands of a computer expert now accused of cyber-terrorism.
Police last week arrested two men, Agung Setyadi (31) and Agung Prabowo (23), in
separate raids in Central Java. Branded as "cyber-terrorists", the two have been
charged with using computer technology to help Samudra organize the October 2005
Bali blasts.
Samudra and two other terrorists, Amrozi and Mukhlas, have been in jail for over two
years after being sentenced to death for masterminding the October 2002 Bali
nightclub bombings that killed 202 people.
Police say Setyadi in June 2005 paid a courier company, PT Tiki Jalur Nugraha
Ekakurir to deliver an Ecs brand laptop with a wireless connection to a guard at Bali's
Kerobokan jail. The guard, following instructions from Setyadi, then gave the laptop to
Samudra, enabling him to connect to the internet and communicate with other
militants.
Colonel Petrus Golose, head of the National Police's cyber-crime unit, said Samudra
used the laptop to chat with Setyadi and other extremists in religious chatrooms for
several months up to the time of the second bombings. Their conversations, in which
Samudra used the Arabic alias 'alirhab', allegedly covered how to conduct online
credit card fraud to raise funds for terror attacks.
"Imam Samudra... directed the fund-raising for the second Bali bombing… The laptop
allowed Imam Samudra to chat without restrictions in Ahlussunnah and CafeIslam
chatrooms. This took place before the second Bali bombing," Golose was quoted as
saying by Reuters.
After the 2005 Bali blasts, in which three suicide bombers hit one restaurant and two
beachside cafes, Samudra, Amrozi and Mukhlas were swiftly transferred to
Nusakambangan island jail off the southern coast of Central Java.
Prabowo is accused of helping to create a website, www.anshar.net, which was
launched last year and provided instructions on how and where to kill foreigners in
Jakarta, such as shooting people "several times" in the heart and head at certain
malls, hotels and restaurants. Police said Prabowo, who uses the aliases Max
Fiderman, Kalingga and Maxhaser, was a student and a professional hacker, who
worked with Samudra in cyber-crime.
Golose said the two arrests had greatly reduced the likelihood of a further terror
attack, but he added that authorities remain "on alert".
He said Setyadi had smuggled the laptop to Samudra at the request of fugitive
terrorist Noordin Mohammad Top, who has played key roles in a series of bombings
perpetrated by regional terror network Jemaah Islamiyah.
He said the arrests showed that terrorists were turning to the internet to raise funds,
rather than relying on couriers to deliver money from al Qaeda. "Now they recruit
people who understand technology, this is technology-based crime," he was quoted
as saying by the Sydney Morning Herald daily.
Golose said police have no direct evidence linking Samudra to the 2005 bombings,
although Prabowo had allegedly sent an email praising Samudra for the "amazing"
attack.
University Shocked
Setyadi worked as a lecturer in information technology at Stikubank University
(Unisbank) in Semarang, Central Java.
Unisbank deputy rector Isworo Nugroho said Setyadi had been grading students'
theses when he was first visited by police on August 15. He said seven plainclothes
policemen then came to the university campus on August 16 and detained the
lecturer. The following day, he said, police returned with an interrogation record and
copied all of the data from Setyadi's computer at the campus.
Unisbank rector Riki Y. Sutomo said the university's academic community was
shocked to learn of the allegations against Setyadi. He said that whatever the lecturer
had done, it was in his capacity as a private citizen and was in no way connected to
the activities of the university.
At Setyadi's house, police seized a laptop owned by Samudra's lawyer Achmad
Michdan, two hard disks, two mobile phones, three SIM cards, one Flash disk, one
Bluetooth USB adapter, six digital compact discs, as well as a poster of Osama bin
Laden and some books on jihad.
Setyadi's wife Imtikhanah on Friday (25/8/06) said her husband was very open with
her and had never spoken about Imam Samudra, so she suspected the charges
against him were concocted by police. She said that in cyberspace, anyone could
call themselves Imam Samudra or any other name.
But Setyadi was at least known among radical Islamic circles. He was a member of
the Semarang Islamic Activists Forum, which in June accompanied radical cleric Abu
Bakar Baasyir to the city following his release from jail in Jakarta after serving a
26-month sentence for conspiracy over the 2002 Bali bombings.
Lawyers Deny Samudra Used their Laptop
National Police headquarters on Friday questioned two members of the Bali bombers'
Muslim Defense Team (TPM), Achmad Michdan and Gilroy, over the laptop seized at
Setyadi's house.
Michdan claimed he had only recently given his laptop to Gilroy, who last week
delivered it to Setyadi to be repaired. "The two of us were asked to explain the
chronology of how the laptop in question ended up in Agung Setyadi's hands," he was
quoted as saying by detikcom online news portal.
He said the laptop merely contained data related to the cases of the Bali bombers
and certain terror suspects.
Separately, TPM coordinator Mahendradatta said Michdan had donated his laptop to
the defense team, which then passed it on to Setyadi to repair the hard disk.
"Two hours after the laptop was delivered to the house, Agung Setyadi was arrested,"
he was quoted as saying by the Media Indonesia daily's online edition.
Mahendradatta strongly denied that Michdan's laptop had ever been used by
Samudra. He also said Setyadi had never met with Samudra, adding that "it can be
somebody else" who communicated online with the death row prisoner.
He said the police's claim that Samudra used a laptop while in jail could be "just a
trick" to foil the legal team's effort to win a final appeal for the three death row Bali
bombers. He also claimed Samudra had no money to buy a laptop.
"I'm always wary of such matters and won't rule out the possibility. The evidence for
the cyber-terrorism claim is not transparent because it involves cyberspace," he was
quoted as saying by detikcom.
"It's not impossible that this is a ruse by the police to trap the Islamic terrorists and
keep them in jail. And it's not so different from the ensnaring of Abu Bakar Baasyir,"
he said.
"I feel puzzled. Imam Samudra is not the sort of person who has money. How could
he own a sophisticated piece of equipment like that? Furthermore, Imam Samudra
was not very popular in Kerobokan jail. How could anyone want to help an unpopular
person?" asked Mahendradatta.
Meanwhile, officials at PT Tiki Jalur Nugraha Ekakurir, the courier company that
allegedly delivered the laptop from Semarang to Bali, said they had no record of any
delivery to the jail in June 2005. Company accountant Nyoman Alit Septiniwati said a
more through check could be made if police can provide the receipt number for the
package, although it was apparently been thrown away by the recipient or sender.
Police Defend Action
National Police spokesman Senior Commissioner Bambang Kuncoko on Thursday
denied that officers had violated any procedures in seizing Michdan's laptop. "Go
ahead if you want to protest, the procedures were followed. This laptop is being
investigated," he said.
He said the owner of the laptop would not be charged with any offense if police
discovered the computer had been used for cyber-terrorism without his knowledge.
Kuncoko said police and the Justice and Human Rights Ministry are jointly
investigating the Bali prison guard over his role in delivering the laptop. "We are
looking at weaknesses in the prison regulations that allowed the laptop to be brought
into the cell," he said.
He said the guard could be charged under Article 55 of the Criminal Code on being an
accessory to a crime. The article states that an accessory to a crime shall be subject
to the same sentence as those who directly carried out the crime. Which means the
guard could face the death penalty if charged and convicted.
Kerobokan chief warden Ilham Djaja claimed he was very surprised to learn that a
computer had been smuggled into his jail because security and supervision were very
strict, especially for the Bali bombers. "If that laptop was in the prison, then it should
have been found in the cell when Amrozi and the others were transferred from
Kerobokan to Nusakambangan," he said, adding that computers and mobile phones
were clearly banned from jails.
'State Crime'
Adrianus Meliala, a lecturer in criminology at the University of Indonesia, said the fact
that a laptop was smuggled into the jail cell of a convicted terrorist mastermind could
not be glossed over as a mere procedural error but was instead a crime of the state.
He said the incident must prompt the government to carry out a thorough overhaul of
prison security. "Supervision of convicts like this must be tightened. How could a
laptop get in? This is not an insignificant matter and neither a mistake nor procedural
neglect. This is a crime of the state," he was quoted as saying by detikcom.
Meliala said the incident was proof of the state's failure to supervise convicted
criminals, especially terrorists. "This is a massive slap in the state's face. If a convict
in a big case can get away with this, then what about smaller cases?"
He said parliament must summon Justice and Human Rights Minister Hamid
Awaluddin and demand an explanation. "This sort of thing cannot be allowed to
happen."
House of Representatives speaker Agung Laksono concurred, saying he would ask
parliament's Commission III on legal affairs to summon the minister. "This [smuggling
of a laptop to a terrorist] must not be allowed to happen. It must not be permitted.
This must be questioned and investigated."
He said Commission III should ask Awaluddin to ensure that similar cases are not
occurring at other prisons in Indonesia. "I think Commission III must ask questions
about the general state of prisons because mobile phones are also not allowed [to be
given to prisoners]," he said.
Laksono urged police to thoroughly investigate the Bali prison guard involved in the
laptop case. "The prison guard also must not be allowed to get away with this," he
said.
It's no secret that wealthy prisoners can buy almost anything in Indonesia's corrupt
jails, including weekend leave to take drugs and visit prostitutes. Affluent inmates
serving time for corruption enjoy a range of modern conveniences, including mobile
phones, in their relatively luxurious cells. Some prisoners have even bribed their way
out of jail.
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