Expert: State Loss Audit Must Exist Before Yaqut is a Suspect
JAKARTA - Criminal law expert Mahrus Ali emphasized that the determination of the status of a suspect against former Minister of Religion Yaqut Cholil Qoumas was invalid because there had been no investigative audit of state financial losses. Mahrus said that the investigative audit of state financial losses must have been completed before the determination of the suspect was carried out.
This was conveyed by Mahrus, who was presented as an expert in the pre-trial hearing of Yaqut at the South Jakarta District Court, Thursday, March 4. Initially, Mahrus answered questions from Yaqut's lawyer regarding the article that ensnared his client.
"So if we refer to the new Criminal Code, it says that there is a loss. For the delict to be proven in the article on corruption, the loss of the state, the delict is said to be voltooid (complete) when there is an investigative audit that confirms that there has been a financial loss to the state. If there is none, the delict has not been voltooid (complete)," said Mahrus at the trial.
Mahrus explained that the corruption case that ensnared Yaqut was a material offense. Where, he said, the investigation of the case was carried out because of the consequences that arose, in this case, the state's loss.
"One, material delict. Two, material omission delict. The third, delict qualified as a result. These three types of delicts, it is mandatory to prove the causal relationship in the sense that there must be an effect. In the context of this article, there must be an effect in the form of state financial losses calculated by a state institution which states that based on the results of the investigation audit, state financial losses have arisen," said Mahrus.
Mahrus was then asked by Yaqut's lawyer about the status of the determination of the suspect by the KPK. Mahrus said the determination of the suspect against Yaqut was invalid.
"And it (the investigation audit of state financial losses) must have existed before the designation of a person as a suspect, not afterwards," yerangn
"(The determination of a suspect against Yaqut) is not valid," he added.
It is known that the report on the calculation of state losses is indeed one of the crucial points questioned by the Yaqut party. Because, the calculation is one of the evidence used by the KPK in accusing Yaqut.
Yaqut himself admitted that he had not received a report on the state's losses until the end of February. Which should have, according to them, the report should have been there before the KPK named Yaqut as a suspect.
"In addition, until this Answer Letter was submitted, we did not see a real and certain calculation of losses, including the absence of a date listed in the audit results when it was carried out or indeed it had not been completed," said Yaqut's lawyer, Mellisa Anggraeni, in a trial at the South Jakarta District Court, Wednesday, March 4.