Indonesian gets death sentence in gangrape case

The leader of an Indonesian gang who murdered and gang-raped a schoolgirl was sentenced to death Thursday, in a high-profile case that led to the introduction of tougher punishments for child sex offenders.

Zainal was handed the death penalty at a court on western Sumatra island while four other men were sentenced to 20 years each over the case.

The murder and gang-rape of the 14-year-old, who was attacked by a group of men and boys in April as she made her way back from school, shocked the country and sparked a national debate about a failure to tackle endemic sexual violence.

President Joko Widodo responded to growing anger about the case in May by introducing tough new punishments for child sex offenders, including a maximum penalty of death, chemical castration and forcing convicted paedophiles to wear electronic monitoring devices.

Following the discovery of the teenager’s body tied up and naked in the woods, police arrested 13 people over the attack while one alleged perpetrator is still at large.

Zainal, a 23-year-old who like many Indonesians goes by one name, was sentenced to death for premeditated murder, which was a crime already punishable by death before the new laws were introduced. “This sentence was handed down because the defendant was the one who persuaded other defendants (to commit the crime),” presiding judge Heny Farida told the court in the town of Curup.

The mother of the victim shouted in protest demanding all the defendants be sentenced to death.