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Garuda Open to Private Settlement With Tommy Suharto
Heru Andriyanto | April 27, 2011

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devine
6:40pm Apr 27, 2011

Hope they dont settle. Really looking forward to see what the court decides... it says it everywhere, incl here at JG, Tommy IS a convicted murderer. So what is the point? He should have thought about his reputation before ordering a murder and he should be happy that he could walk out after 4 years. Anybody else and EVERYWHERE would not be able to walk after 4 years for the murder of a Supreme Court judge... it is one of these "Wonderful Indonesia" stories...

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A lawyer for Garuda Indonesia said on Wednesday that he would welcome an out-of-court settlement with Hutomo “Tommy” Mandala Putra who is suing the company over an article that appeared in the magazine’s in-flight magazine.

”Before the verdict is read, there is a chance for a mutual settlement,” Garuda lawyer Ahmad Maulana told reporters at the South Jakarta District Court. “We would be happy if we can get such a settlement, but I still haven’t received instructions.”

Tommy is suing Garuda and the publishers of the magazine, Indo Multi Media, for Rp 25 billion ($2.9 million) in damages over the article that describes the youngest son of former President Suharto as a “convicted murderer.”

In 2002, Tommy was sentenced to 15 years for ordering the July 2001 murder of Supreme Court Justice Syafiuddin Kartasasmita, who convicted him of fraud in 2000. The fraud conviction was overturned and he was released after serving just four years of his sentence for murder.

Ahmad, during his closing in court, concluded that “the lawsuit should be declared unacceptable.”

Garuda should not be held accountable for the article and the lawsuit should be directed against the writer, he said.

He argued the financial losses claimed by Tommy were groundless and irrelevant to the lawsuit.

Tommy has complained that because of the article, a golf tournament hosted by his company failed to get sponsorship.

“How can we draw a link between the golf tournament and the points of the lawsuit? We can’t understand that someone held a tournament than transferred the cost burden to someone else. We consider that the lawsuit should not be accepted by the judges,” Ahmad said.

Ferri Firman Nurwahyu, an attorney for Tommy, said the employer-and-worker relationship should apply in the case so Garuda and Indo Multi Media were fully responsible for publishing the article.

“Negotiations have collapsed since the beginning, so therefore we continue with our lawsuit in the court,” he said. “The Garuda magazine is managed by the employees of Garuda and IMM and the employers must held responsible.”

Presiding Judge Tahsin said the verdict would be delivered on May 16.

The article the spurred the case, “A New Destination to Enjoy in Bali,” published in December 2009, reviewed Tommy’s Pecatu Indah Resort.