This is the second time in recent months we’ve seen an Indonesian police officer put his body on the line to stop a traffic violator, but this latest incident ended in quite an unexpected way.
Recently, a video of a police officer who jumped onto the hood of a moving car in order to stop it for a traffic violation has gone viral. The video was taken on Monday afternoon on Pasar Minggu Street in South Jakarta and the traffic police officer has been identified as Brigadier Eka Setiawan.
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If his daring act seems familiar to you, that’s because another cop in the city Bandung did the same thing in July.
Speaking to the media, Eka said he spotted the car, a Honda Mobilio, illegally parked on the sidewalk. He said he asked the driver — identified as a 54-year-old man named Tavipuddin — for his STNK (vehicle registration documents) and SIM (driver’s license) but the driver didn’t comply.
Eka said he and Tavipuddin quarreled because the driver believed the police officer didn’t have any right to ask for his license, let alone give him a ticket.
“We told him ‘Sir, if you don’t want your car to be towed, we will ticket you’. But he didn’t want [to cooperate with us], even after we told him politely, so the driver attempted to run away,” Eka told Detik on Monday.
Tavipuddin first attempted to flee by backing up his car, causing him to hit a motorcycle behind him. Then, Eka tried to stop him by throwing himself on the hood of the car and stayed there, even as Tavipuddin continued to step on the gas pedal.
“I got on top of the car hood, then I was carried as far as 200 meters,” Eka said.
Tavipuddin eventually stopped driving after he hit another car on the road. Eka and other officers then found that his SIM had expired last year.
Police took Tavipuddin and his wife to the Pasar Minggu Police Station. They also brought Tavipuddin’s car, which had been damaged after being pelted with heavy objects by onlookers during the incident, for evidence.
Police initially said Tavipuddin may face criminal charges for using violence against authorities, which carries a potential maximum sentence of one year and four months in prison.
However, at a press conference yesterday, Eka said he revoked his report against Tavipuddin after finding out that he’s currently battling stage 4 cancer. Tavipuddin was reportedly on his way home from a chemotherapy session when the incident occurred.
“We initially didn’t know [about Tavipuddin’s sickness]. When we got to the police station, I talked to his wife, she was kind. She said his condition [wasn’t really good] because he has undergone six sessions of chemotherapy if I’m not mistaken, so we agreed to forgive everything,” Eka told reporters yesterday, as quoted by CNN Indonesia.
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Tavipuddin also apologized to Eka and the public at yesterday’s press conference.
“I apologize to the public, especially to Officer Eka, who could have been a victim even though he wasn’t hurt. I request the public not to imitate what I did, what I did was wrong, I am sorry,” Tavipuddin said.
Eka and Tavipuddin agreed to resolve the matter in a kekeluargaan manner. Kekeluargaan, which roughly translates to “between family members”, is an Indonesian euphemism for amicably coming to an agreement not to press charges for a crime.
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