Ratna Sarumpaet Facing 10 Years Jail Sentence; Hopes to Walk Free
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28 May 2019 10:30 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Activist Ratna Sarumpaet, the defendant in the case of spreading false claims, hopes that the public prosecutor will drop charges against her. Prosecutors are scheduled to read their indictment in today's hearing at the South Jakarta District Court.
"I want to walk free—what else is there to hope for?" she told reporters this morning, May 28.
Prosecutors are ready to bring number of people to the witness chair, including as Ratna's driver, academic Rocky Gerung, and Amien Rais. Ratna Sarampaet's defense team has also prepared a number of witnesses; including criminal experts to linguists.
In the previous hearing, Ratna was cross-examined by both the prosecutors and her defense team, where she testified about the chronological events that led to her trial.
Read: Ratna Sarumpaet Considers Tompi Her Saviour
Ratna's case began when she claimed to have been assaulted by several people in Bandung, on September last yeat. However, the police discovered that it was all a lie after they tracked down the activist's whereabouts during said dates. Ratna then admitted she told a lie, and confessed that the bruises on her face were the result of a cosmetics surgery at a hospital in Central Jakarta.
Ratna Sarumpaet is being charged with two accounts. She is accused of violating Article 14 of Law no.1/1946 for spreading lies, and deliberately causing public unrest. For this she is facing up to 19 years in prison.
She is also charged with violating Law no.19/2016, a.k.a., the Electronic Information and Transactions Law (UU ITE) for spreading false information with the purpose of inciting discriminative hate and hostility between individuals/groups. The maximum punishment for this violation is a prison sentence of 6 years.
TEMPO