Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Wednesday, April 12, 2006
Two men held here in alleged arms deal
The undercover probe involves weapons and aircraft parts bound for Indonesia
By Debra Barayuga, dbarayuga@starbulletin.com
Two men are accused of trying to smuggle military aircraft parts and nearly $3.3
million in firearms, including state-of-the-art submachine guns, into Indonesia.
A criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court on Monday charged Ignatius
Ferdinandus Soeharli, also known as "Igna," of Indonesia, and David Beecroft, of
Singapore, with conspiracy to export restricted defense items without a license.
The two were arrested in Honolulu over the weekend.
They were named in a five-page complaint that also identifies uncharged
co-conspirators Ibrahim Bin Amran and Hadianto Djoko Djuliarso. Amran and Djuliarso
were indicted by a grand jury in the Eastern District of Michigan on April 4 with
conspiracy, money laundering and violations of the Arms Export Control Act.
Djuliarso has admitted to federal agents that Soeharli was the financier for the
transaction, according to court documents.
The charges capped a yearlong undercover investigation -- including meetings in
London and Detroit -- apparently triggered by contact from an employee of Indodial, a
company allegedly owned and operated by Djuliarso and Amran, to buy military
aircraft parts through an unnamed U.S.-based company for export to Indonesia, court
documents say.
In May, in a check of its records, the U.S. Office of Foreign Asset Control found that
Indodial had no export applications for licenses, according to court documents.
Soeharli and Beecroft arrived in Honolulu on April 7 and were met by undercover
federal agents. They were taken to a meeting with representatives of the U.S.
company, Amran and Djuliarso, to view samples of MP-5 submachine guns and
military aircraft parts, according to court documents.
The men were told they had to obtain an export license to buy the parts and weapons,
which were on the U.S. Munitions List, but "all of the individuals indicated their desire
to proceed with the transaction without obtaining the necessary export licenses,"
court documents say. After the meeting, the men were taken to view the military
aircraft parts.
In earlier meetings in London last June and in Detroit in December, Amran revealed
that the true purchaser was a company called Ataru Indonesia owned by Djuliarso,
according to an affidavit prepared by Steven Marceleno, senior special agent with
Immigration and Customs Enforcement assigned to the anti-smuggling group.
Amran stressed the need to keep the transaction secret, and also indicated that he
knew exporting the radar parts and other defense articles was "criminal," according to
the affidavit.
On Jan. 5, Amran called a U.S.-based company from Singapore seeking quotes for
the cost of Heckler & Koch firearms, including 882 MP-5 submachine guns, 800 9
mm handguns and 16 sniper rifles, the affidavit says. He was quoted a price of $3.3
million.
By March 31, he and Djuliarson had sent nearly half a million dollars as a partial
payment to the U.S.-based company, according to the complaint. Less than a week
later, Amran notified the company's representatives that he had obtained plane tickets
for all of them to come to Hawaii.
Illegal cache
Two men were arrested in Honolulu over the weekend for allegedly trying to smuggle
military aircraft parts and nearly $3.3 million in firearms into Indonesia, including:
» 882 MP-5 sub- machine guns
» 800 9 mm handguns
» 16 sniper rifles
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