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Maid planned Bedok double murder: Indonesian police

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S'pore and Indonesian police to work together to solve case

The Indonesian maid arrested over the deaths of her employers in Singapore had planned the murder, according to national police spokesman Setyo Wasisto.

"Based on the facts of the case, it may be considered a premeditated murder. She had planned the act, down to buying rope and tape (to restrain her victims)," he said in Jakarta yesterday.

Indonesian maid Khasanah, who was on the run for almost a week after her employers, Mr Chia Ngim Fong, 79, and his wife, Madam Chin Sek Fah, 78, were found tied up and later pronounced dead in their Bedok flat, was arrested last Tuesday night.

She had been working as a domestic helper in Singapore for only about a month.

The 41-year-old was arrested in Indonesia's Tungkal Ilir in Jambi province, after local police raided her room at Hotel Nanber following a tip-off from residents.

At the time of her arrest, Khasanah was in the midst of planning to leave for Java, said Hotel Nanber owner Syartini. Khasanah had fled Singapore by the time her employers were found dead in their Bedok flat.

Inspector-General Setyo could not confirm how Khasanah left Singapore or entered Indonesia. But a source in Singapore familiar with the investigation had told The Straits Times she had left Singapore using her passport but was not stopped as her crime had not yet been discovered.

Khasanah is now in the national police detective unit's lock-up.

She will not be handed over to Singapore but, instead, Indonesian investigators and their counterparts from the Singapore Police Force will work together to solve the crime.

This is because Indonesia adopts the principle of "personaliteit", police had said earlier. Personaliteit requires that any Indonesian arrested in the country for a crime committed overseas be processed in Indonesia instead of being sent to the jurisdiction where the offence took place.

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