The South Jakarta Police are investigating the ownership and origins of nearly 1,000 firearms found at a private school in South Jakarta, which were found along with suspected narcotics, pornographic materials and a room resembling a bunker.
South Jakarta Police spokesperson Adj Comr Joko Adiwibowo said on Thursday the case is currently in the investigation stage, with the police having received a report from the public about the weapons, as quoted by Antara.
The items were discovered at the Harapan Ibu Islamic School Foundation in Pondok Pinang, South Jakarta, when school officials on July 10 opened a concealed room they intended to use for school activities, according to the school foundation’s lawyer Hermawanto.
The lawyer added school officials sought the police’s assistance to open other locked rooms last Wednesday and found more weapons as well as ammunition-making equipment and manuals on making ammo.
Other items discovered from the rooms included a box containing pornographic CDs and suspected narcotics such as crystal methamphetamine and marijuana.
The school foundation also found a concealed room resembling a bunker, and will ask for the police to help open it, citing legal risks, Hermawanto went on to say.
The items discovered on July 10 were found in a room belonging to the former school foundation chair, identified only by his initials IWD. He was dismissed in April, but retained the keys to the room, according to Hermawanto.
IWD, through his lawyer, denied the weapons found were firearms, saying they are legally licensed airsoft guns owned by PT Lokta Karya Perbakin, a company affiliated with the Indonesian Target Shooting and Hunting Association.
Alhadid Endar Putra, IWD’s lawyer and managing director of PT Lokta Karya Perbakin, said the equipment had been kept at the school for shooting and archery extracurricular programmes.
“These are legally owned items. They are not firearms in the conventional sense, but primarily airsoft guns used for sports and school extracurricular activities,” Alhadid said, as quoted by Kompas.com.
He added there were permits issued in 2008 from the police for the weapons, which had been stored at the school since 2021 with the knowledge of the foundation’s previous management.
According to Alhadid, most of the airsoft guns are no longer functional, and the shooting extracurricular activity was discontinued after its instructor, identified only by the initial S, died in 2022.
On Friday afternoon, the Jakarta Police identified the weapons’ owner as an individual identified as DS, who died in 2020, but stopped short of providing further details about his connection to the school foundation.
Of all the weapons found at the school premises, 995 were identified as air guns and only one, a Franchi SPAS-15 12-gauge, was a live firearm, said Jakarta Police spokesperson Sr Comr Budi Hermanto.
He added the police would question IWD to clarify the origin, ownership, permits, storage location and intended use of the weapons. — The Jakarta Post/ANN
