Jakarta Globe, February 9, 2014.
Jakarta. The head of a Bandar Lampung hospital has been suspended and eight hospital employees have been named suspects after they allegedly abandoned a dying, elderly patient in a shanty.
Bandar Lampung Mayor Herman H. N. said Indrasari Aulia, the director of Dr. A. Dadi Tjokrodipo Hospital, had been suspended, and so had eight employees of the hospital currently in police detention after police named them suspects in the case.
Police have yet to bring a legal charge against Indrasari.
“We’ve made this decision [suspension] to help the investigation into the case,” Herman said on Saturday in Bandar Lampung, according to Indonesian news portal tempo.co. “They [Indrasari and the eight employees] will be discharged dishonorably if they’re proven guilty in court.”
Herman said he was angered by the incident as it was against his administration’s program promising free medical services for Bandar Lampung residents launched in 2011.
It was not immediately clear who had admitted Suparman, 75, to Dr. A. Dadi Tjokrodipo Hospital and when.
However on Jan. 19, six hospital employees allegedly took the unconscious man out in an ambulance and then abandoned him in a vacant shack near a local zoo, allegedly because he was poor and had no relatives.
The dying, reportedly mentally ill patient was found a day later by local residents, who took him back to Dadi, which then transferred him to Abdul Moeloek Hospital. Suparman died on Jan. 21.
The six hospital employees have been identified as ambulance driver Muhaimin, nurse Andi Karyadi, sanitation officers Andi and Andika, office worker Adi and parking lot officer Rudi, kompas.co. reported.
They said they took Suparman out of the hospital based on an order from Heriyansyah, the head of the general and employees subdivision, and Mahendri, the head of the E2 section of the hospital.
Police have named all the eight people as suspects. They are currently being held at a Bandar Lampung Police detention facility.
“The number of suspects may grow because we’re still investigating the case,” Bandar Lampung Police chief Sr. Comr. Dwi Iranto said on Saturday.
He added police were charging the suspects with Articles 304 and 306 of the Criminal Code, which deal with neglect leading to death. Both articles carry a maximum sentence of nine years in prison.
The ambulance driver, Muhaimin, 33, said this was not the first time the hospital threw out a patient, adding that incidents in the past were committed based on orders from a person he identified only as M.
“I forgot how many times it has happened already,” Muhaimin told merdeka.com. “But this was the first time the patient died.”
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ma 10 feb 2014 - 1:14