Fridae

Murder suspect Verry Idam Henyansyah is accused of killing a man in Jakarta and burying at least 10 of his victims including a toddler in the backyard of his parents' house in East Java province. The 30-year-old Koran recital teacher, who is also known as Ryan, first came to the public's attention after he was arrested on Jul 15 - four days after the police found the cut up body parts of Heri Santoso dumped in Ragunan area, South Jakarta. The Jakarta Post reported that Henyansyah confessed to stabbing and dismembering the 40-year-old man in the former's rented apartment after the victim insisted on being introduced to the suspect's boyfriend, Noval Andreas, 28.

The paper quoted a police spokesman as saying: "(Verry) allegedly showed Heri a picture of Noval in the nude, and Heri frankly expressed his desire for Noval. (Verry) reportedly refused his request, saying Noval was his partner, but Heri insisted he would pay him to get Noval."

The suspect soon confessed to the murder of more people in his hometown Jombang, East Java. Police have since unearthed ten bodies from the backyard of his parents' house set among rice paddies and sugarcane.

Henyansyah had reportedly blamed the killings on his family who killed the men out of disgust. He was quoted by Tempo magazine as saying, "Actually, I didn't do the killing. My family killed them. They disapproved of my lifestyle. They killed every man who was close to me."

Although most of the victims are known to be male, the police also recovered the bodies of one woman and a 3-year-old girl. One victim was reported to be a Dutch citizen, though that proved not to be true. The suspect and his boyfriend - it's not known if he is a suspect in the case - are said to have been flown back and forth between Jakarta and East Java while exhumation efforts were ongoing.

According to media reports, the suspect suffers not only from rage fits but has kept the belongings of the victims such as motorbikes, laptops, mobile phones and jewelry which have been retrieved from his house and his close relatives.

Pro and counter opinions offered by a slew of experts such as psychiatrists, psychologist, criminologists and other academicians have been quoted by the mainstream media eager to devote substantial space and air time to the case.

Among the most negative ones are from Erlangga Masdiana, a criminologist at the University of Indonesia, in Tempo [Jul 21-27]: "... that homosexuals commit sadistic killings should not surprise anybody if you know their world. People with deviant sexual behaviour are used to be close to criminal world. They are used to make threats and to use force if someone who is invited to intimacy refuses the offer. With such habits they can commit more serious crimes, of course."

"Homosexuals have stronger feelings of jealousy and they can act quite violently when their wishes are not granted. Gays/homosexuals have a deviant sexual behaviour and their aggressiveness is therefore beyond normal," declared Dadang Hawari, a well-known psychologist, in Berita Kota [Jul 20].

Several other psychologists interviewed offered more balanced comments.

Reza Indragiri, a forensic psychologist, in Warta Kota [Jul 22]: "... there is no relationship between sexual orientation and serial killings. To the contrary, killings among heterogeneous [heterosexual] couples are much more frequent than among homogeneous [homosexual] couples."

Psychologist Tika Bisono, when interviewed by Arus Pelangi [Jul 23] about the prevailing view in the society that homosexuals are inherently brutal, said: "... this [violence] is only related to someone's personality, not to the group he belongs to. His background is the determining factor, not his sexual orientation."

Dr Yunita Kartikasari, a lecturer in legal psychology, said: "... crime can be committed by all kinds of groups, because basically every individual has potentially negative emotions that can lead to criminality; it all depends on the triggering factor, not on the particular group he belongs to."

The fact that the general public still tends to stigmatise LGBTI persons is not surprising. More surprising is the fact that so many academicians still have negative views against homosexuality. This all despite the fact that the international community has moved on in the past four decades with the American Association of Psychiatrists declaring in 1972 that homosexuality should be erased from the category of mental disorders.

The World Health Organization [WHO] declared in a resolution in 1990 that homosexuals are no longer considered mentally ill.

Those two opinions finally reached the ears of Indonesian psychologists; the Indonesian Guidelines to Categorization and Diagnosis of Mental Disorders, Third Edition (1993), ceased to mention homosexuality as a mental disorder.

Yet, old ideas die hard; the Pandora's box has been opened and ordinary people, religious leaders and law enforcers alike have made pronouncements and statements which are very detrimental to LGBTI persons.

A gay man named Darso told Nonstop Daily [Jul 25]: "My friend was arrested in Senen area [Jakarta] during a police razzia [raid]. The reason was not clear. I am now afraid to be kicked out from my apartment. Since the Henyansyah affair started all gays have become afraid."

Indeed, the local police of Senen area, Jakarta, has started checking the rent apartments where many gays live. This action was directly led by police chief A.K.P. Kasmono [Nonstop; Jul 25]. In the same article, the Metropolitan Police Chief Irjen. Adang Firman stated, "The Metropolitan police does not discount that it will conduct raids against [hangout places of] homosexuals."

Even the (Islamic) para-military group Hisbullah, Fery Alfiansyah Noor, joined in the chorus: "Homosexuality is like an infectious disease. That is why the local government should be tough with the usual gay hangout places. If they are left free, they will ultimately infect the larger population." [Nonstop, Jul 25]

The chairman of the Association of Ulamas (Muslim Clerics) of Jakarta, Ashraf Ali, declared: "Gays and lesbians will 100% sure go to hell, because same-sex relationships are forbidden by the Koran." [Nonstop, Jul 25]

Those public exhortations seem to have had an effect on the police.

On Aug 4, Nonstop reported that the police raided a well-known gay disco "Moonlight" in Jakarta on Saturday night [rather Aug 4; 2 am], where they allegedly arrested 100 gay men. The official reason was to look for people who knew Henyansyah. In reality, no arrests were made that night; the management and Arus Pelangi staff who happened to be there, were able to persuade the 30-men strong police team that there was no need to do massive arrests if they were just looking for such information. In the end, the police just searched the crowd for drugs; they found some 'ecstasy' already thrown on the ground. Nonetheless, such blown up stories are typical for sensation-hungry tabloids such as Nonstop; this time they went too far by reporting a complete lie.

LGBT organisations, such as Arus Pelangi, Gaya Nusantara and many others, have come under intense scrutiny by the media; in the end of July and early August, no day passed without a phone call from a TV station or newspaper requesting for an interview or invitation for a (live) talkshow. Arus Pelangi has had to assign several spokespersons to fill the demand. It had the difficult task to counter all these unsavory pronouncements coming from experts, religious leaders and law enforcers.

Yuli Rustinawati of Arus Pelangi had to explain: "There are a lot of heterosexual persons who also become murderers. It's not true the gay and lesbian persons are more possessive than heterosexual persons. Anyone could become a murderer. It has nothing to do with sexual orientation."

On Jul 28, a coalition of 18 non-governmental organisations called for a press conference to highlight the growing concern of civil society that the stigmatisation of LGBT individuals due to the Henyansyah affair had gone too far.

The press conference was covered by the TV stations and newspapers like Indo Pos and The Jakarta Post. Shortly after, it is noted that tabloid newspapers shifted their focus on the psychopathic aspects of Ryan's personality, rather than his homosexuality.

The police investigation is ongoing.

The writer is the Secretariat of Arus Pelangi, a gay advocacy group based in Jakarta. They can be contacted via arus_pelangi@yahoo.co.id.