TEMPO.CO, Jakarta – Personnel from the Jakarta Police’s Criminal Investigation Department were involved in a gunfight with a group of violent motorcycle robbers, locally known as begal, in Cijantung, East Jakarta on Sunday, April 19, 2014.
The police gunned down two muggers during the shootout. “Both were initialed AS, 31, and JW, 28,” said Sr. Comr. Heru Pranoto, the chief of the Jakarta Police’s Criminal Investigation Department on Sunday.
Heru said the muggers’ bodies had been transferred to the police hospital in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta. He explained the shootout broke out when his personnel rolled out a field operation on Sunday in the area.
When passing through Cijantung, he said, the police were suspicious of five people riding four motorcycles and later chased them, but they attempted to flee and AS was the one opening fire first on the police.
During the chase, the police shot down two of them in front of Graha Cijantung at around 3 p.m.
“We are still in pursuit of the other three,” Heru said, adding the police seized allegedly stolen motorbikes and a 9 mm homemade revolver.
LINDA HAIRANI
