10-8-2023 (JAKARTA) Indonesia’s Supreme Court has commuted the death sentence of senior police official Ferdy Sambo, who was convicted of murdering his bodyguard, to life imprisonment, according to an official statement.
Sambo, a two-star general and former head of internal affairs for the national police, became a suspect after his bodyguard was found dead at his residence in July of last year. Initially, the police were accused of covering up the killing.
The high-profile trial, which captured national attention earlier this year, shed light on the prevailing sense of police impunity in the archipelago nation.
Sobandi, the spokesman for the Supreme Court, announced in a statement aired on Metro TV that the judges had reconsidered “the qualifications of the crime.”
The decision to commute Sambo’s sentence came after he filed an appeal with the country’s highest court in May.
Meanwhile, Sambo’s wife, Putri Candrawathi, who was also imprisoned for her involvement in planning the murder, had her appeal approved, resulting in a reduction of her 20-year sentence.
During the trial, Sambo was accused of ordering a subordinate to shoot Brigadier Nofriansyah Yosua Hutabarat, a 27-year-old bodyguard, and subsequently firing a bullet into the wounded victim himself. Initially, when Hutabarat’s death came to light, the police claimed that another member of the security detail had killed him after catching him in the act of sexually assaulting Sambo’s wife.
Sambo and his wife were apprehended several weeks later, after which the legal proceedings against them commenced.
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