Shock Guilty Verdict in Prita Mulyasari Libel Saga

09, 2011

Two years after Prita Mulyasari, a mother of three from Tangerang, was first detained for supposedly defaming an upscale hospital, and after three times having courts find in her favor, the Supreme Court has upheld an appeal and found her guilty.

The 34-year-old has faced a roller-coaster legal battle that started in mid-2008 when Tangerang’s Omni International Hospital reported her for libel for sending e-mails critical of its service to 20 friends.

Although the e-mails were meant to be private, Omni sued Prita in a civil case at the Tangerang District Court, winning Rp 312 million ($37,000). Prita appealed the decision to the Banten High Court, which cut the damages to Rp 204 million, before appealing to the Supreme Court, which quashed it altogether.

At the same time, however, she was tried in a criminal libel case. This time, the Tangerang court threw out prosecutors’ preliminary arguments and later acquitted her during the trial proper. Prosecutors appealed this ruling, and it was this appeal that the Supreme Court upheld on Friday in a ruling posted on its Web site.

“We will fight against the Supreme Court’s decision,” Prita’s husband, Andri Nugroho, told the Jakarta Globe on Friday. “We can still request a case review by presenting new evidence. We will see this case through to the end.”

He said the family was confused by the ruling because the Supreme Court had earlier backed Prita in the civil case.

Prita’s attorney, Slamet Yuwono, said this earlier ruling made it difficult to believe that the Supreme Court would now deliver a guilty verdict in the criminal case.

“It is bizarre that the same court would deliver conflicting rulings in the same libel case. This can serve as new evidence and we will ask for a case review, for sure, because if the announcement on the Web site is true, then Prita must serve time in jail,” he said.

“The ruling also sets a bad precedent because hundreds of thousands of people could be jailed for complaining in an e-mail.

“But we are not sure of anything until we receive official notification from the Supreme Court, because the court’s Web site is sometimes wrong.”

The Web site said three judges — M. Zaharuddin Utama, Salman Luthan and R. Imam Harjadi — accepted on June 30 the appeal by prosecutors, who in November 2009 had recommended a six- month jail term for Prita. The Web site, however, did not specify a jail term and the court’s spokesman, Hatta Ali, did not respond to calls for comment on Friday.

Tangerang’s chief prosecutor, Chaerul Amir, meanwhile, said he was ready to imprison the mother of three as soon as official notification of the verdict was received.

“We have recommended six months, but we don’t know if our appeal was accepted entirely or partly,” he said.

Prita was detained by prosecutors for three weeks in early 2009 and only released after a public outcry, with many prominent figures, including former President Megawati Sukarnoputri, visiting her in jail to show support. Some Rp 800 million was also raised from public donations to help fight her case.

Her trial started in June 2009 but the judges in Tangerang immediately dismissed the case on the grounds the prosecution had used the wrong law to indict her.

However, prosecutors successfully challenged the preliminary ruling and the High Court ordered a retrial, in which Prita was acquitted in November 2009.

( the JG)

July 11, 2011
The Supreme Court published a verdict on its Web site on Friday stating that defamation defendant Prita Mulyasari was guilty of libel in a criminal case over her e-mailed criticism of Omni Hospital in 2008. (JG Photo/Safir Makki) The Supreme Court published a verdict on its Web site on Friday stating that

Tangerang mother Prita Mulyasari, facing jail time after the Supreme Court found her guilty of libel, said she did not understand why law enforcers were so eager to go after the vulnerable while taking a soft stance on high-profile graft cases.

“My case is just one of many small cases that prosecutors have eagerly pursued. I really find it odd that our law-enforcement officials prefer to handle small cases rather than big corruption cases,” the 34-year-old said in an interview with the Jakarta Globe on Sunday.

“Why are things so backward in the Indonesian legal system?”

A notice on the Supreme Court’s Web site said that Prita had been found guilty of libel under the 2008 Electronic Transactions and Information (ITE) Law for e-mails she sent to friends in which she complained about the service at Tangerang’s Omni International Hospital.

Her protracted legal battle began when the upscale hospital reported her to police for defamation and filed a separate civil case in the middle of 2008.

The mother of three pointed to another case in Tangerang in which an elderly maid was detained on trivial charges of stealing plates and ox tail from her employer. The maid was eventually acquitted after the trial sparked a public outcry.

Regarding her case, Prita said the ITE Law remained contentious and had never been adequately explained.

“I don’t thing the ITE Law has ever been properly explained to people. People need to be aware that they can be charged under this law for sending private e-mails,” she said. “I had heard of the ITE Law but I didn’t understand the details of it.”

Prita said that during her trial, even the judges and the prosecutors didn’t fully understand the law, “let alone ordinary people like me.”

But the thing that confuses her most is just why she was such a major target for prosecutors, who doggedly pursued her case for more than two years, even after the Tangerang District Court had acquitted her of the criminal charges and the Supreme Court had cleared her in the civil suit.

“I’m wondering if the prosecutors used their hearts when prosecuting my case, which inflicted no losses on the state whatsoever,” she said.

“Why didn’t they just stop there when I won this case? Why did they file an appeal against my acquittal?”

The libel case became a public issue in early 2009 when Prita was detained for three weeks despite concerns that her second child still needed to breast-feed and allegations that prosecutors had accepted bribes from the hospital.

In that election year, many prominent figures, including former President Megawati Sukarnoputri and top officials from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s Democratic Party, visited Prita in jail to show support.

“I was so glad that so many people were supporting me at that time, including some prominent public figures,” Prita said. “But I just hope that their support was not merely to get sympathy ahead of the presidential election in July 2009. I hope that they really meant it and were really sincere about it.”

Now, with a third child who is just a year old, Prita faces imprisonment again and is expected to learn the length of her sentence at a hearing today.

(x the JG)

July 11, 2011

Prita Mulyasari has been sentenced to six months in jail, suspended for one year, after the Supreme Court controversially found her guilty of libeling privately owned Omni International Hospital in a private email.

Supreme Court Justice Salman Luthan was quoted by Antara as saying the Tangerang mother needed to show good behavior for the next year, or risk having the jail term imposed.

Salman gave the only dissenting opinion in controversial ruling,

He said Prita’s email was not unconnected to the service she experienced at the Tangerang hospital.

“That’s why it did not qualify for libel,” Salman said.




( x the JG)

July 12, 2011



The House of Representatives has agreed to summon representatives from the Attorney General’s Office and Supreme Court to explain the shock suspended jail sentence handed to embattled Indonesian mother-of-three Prita Mulyasari.

Prita was given a suspended six-month sentence on Monday that allows the mother of three to avoid jail in the controversial libel case.

The Supreme Court found Prita guilty of libeling Tangerang’s Omni International Hospital for an e-mail she sent to friends complaining about its service. But the suspended sentence means Prita avoids jail in a three-year legal saga that has outraged many in the country.

Prita, accompanied by her husband and lawyer, Slamet Yuwono, appeared before House Commission III for legal affairs on Tuesday to seek political support as her legal nightmare continues.

Slamet told the commission that he hoped it could summon the attorney general and the judges who handled his client’s appeal to explain the verdict.

The commission agreed, scheduling a hearing for next Monday.

Supreme Court Justice Salman Luthan was quoted by Antara news agency as saying on Monday that if Prita stayed out of trouble for the next year, the six-month sentence wouldn’t be imposed.

Salman was the lone dissenting voice in the court’s guilty verdict, arguing that Prita’s e-mail was valid as it was connected to her treatment by the hospital.

Slamet said on Tuesday that although Prita had received only a suspended sentence, they would challenge the guilty verdict.

“We cannot accept the Supreme Court ruling and we will file for a judicial review as soon as we receive the official copy of the verdict from the Tangerang District Court,” he said. “Hopefully, we can get the copy within 14 working days or even sooner.”

The lawyer said that despite the suspended sentence, Prita still had to carry around the stigma of being a convicted criminal, which he said was unfair for his client.

Speaking in Bali, the minister for women’s empowerment, Linda Gumelar, offered her support for Prita.

The minister said the guilty verdict was “regrettable” because the e-mail in question was meant as constructive criticism for the hospital.

“I hope that law enforcement officials will … deliver a just verdict that champions the vulnerable,” she said on Monday. “We don’t want Prita to have to carry around the label of criminal in the eyes of her children and family.”

Gumelar said any criticism of public or private services should be welcomed and that Prita did not deserve her conviction.

She stressed, however, that the government should not interfere in the case, even if some officials disagreed with the court’s decision.
The verdict was met with some public anger. One supporter denounced the ruling on news radio station El Shinta, and called for a boycott of Omni.

“So the court says the law must be upheld. I say don’t stop with Prita. I’m calling on my friends and all listeners to never visit Omni for treatment, and the hospital can sue me and the court can convict me,” the caller said, without giving his name.

“Under the standard set by the Prita case, my penalty for violating the ITE [Electronic Transactions and Information Law] is even heavier,” he said.

( also x the JG)