The Bali Police

First Police Report

My first police report was admittedly naive. I didn't know then why I had lost the divorce trial, and didn't know that Made Jati's witnesses had committed apparent perjury, that the testimony of my witnesses had been falsified, or that Austrindo Law Office apparently had something to do with my loss.

My attorney M. Rifan SH of Austrindo Law Office accompanied me to the main police headquarters, Polda Bali, and translated for me as I reported suspected Fraud.

 

November 2005   —   Made Jati Reported at Polda Bali for False Documents

 

I was disappointed when the investigator Wayan Karta told me a few weeks later that they had dropped the investigation because all witnesses had confirmed a Balinese wedding had occurred in 1996 and therefore they found no evidence of a crime.

But I was astonished and angry three months later to learn from my new attorneys, Maharidzal SH and Mangasi Simangunsong SH, that I had never reported Fraud - Penipuan - at all.

Rifan had misled me in his translation. I had reported Pengelapan - or Embezzlement - which under Indonesian law is impossible between husband and wife.

 

Second Police Report

With my new attorneys Maharidzal and Mangasi Simangunsong, I reported again at Polda Bali, this time with the correct term for Fraud - Penipuan.

It took over four hours of negotiation before Maharidzal and Simangunsong were satisfied with the assignment of an investigator, Hagnyono SH, they felt we could trust.

 

March 2006   —   Made Jati Again Reported at Polda Bali for Fraud

 

Hagnyono examined twenty-one witnesses along with photographs and documents, and eventually Made Jati was called for examination as a suspect. She admitted that the Balinese marriage ceremony she claimed for 1996 had never occurred.

The file was sent to the Public Prosecutor, but there it ran into strong opposition from unnamed "people upstairs". Prosecuting a Balinese woman for fraud against her American husband, we were told, would be bad for the image of Bali. The case began to bounce back and forth between Polda Bali and the Prosecutor every fourteen days, with the Prosecutor asking for increasingly opaque clarifications, and Polda providing increasingly repetitive answers.

 

Third Police Report

Examining family documents in late 2006, I found another suspected fraud. In 1992 Made Jati had used a letter from Tabanan, certifying that she was a single woman living in Tabanan, to transfer the land title for what is now Kori Restaurant into her name.

I reported the documents to Polres Tabanan, and after several months of investigation, Polres Tabanan called Made Jati as a suspect and she again admitted that the statements in the documents were untrue.

 

April 2007   —   Made Jati Reported at Polres Tabanan for Suspected False Documents