The death of Irzen Octa in interrogation in Jakarta has raised an outcry internationally. What is a bit surprising is that his interrogators were not Indonesian police but Citibank employees. The company who proclaims “your Citi never sleeps” appears to harshly interrogated the man for hours in a tiny room over just $5,700 on his Citibank credit card.
Octa, 50, was reportedly held in a room no larger than “the size of a broom closet” and was beaten. While some insist that there were blood stains on the floor, others question the report of physical abuse.
The bank offered Octa’s family a monthly stipend and life insurance for his widow, but she is suing for millions.
Even without physical abuse, there would be a powerful false imprisonment claim in the United States in the time, manner, and place of the interrogation as we have seen in other cases.
Source: Washington Post
Yes! Finally something about pay and go deals.
I am Muji Harjo from Bandung city – country Indonesia, I am also a victim of debt collectors Bank UOB Buana Indonesia
The difference if irzen Octa died, I was severely injured, brow bone and eye bone fractured bone grafting surgery and should be in the hospital with rp cost around 70 million.
News about me on http://www.google.com type in: Nasabah Muji Harjo or UOB Buana Muji or debt collector UOB Buana.
Thank you
Saya juga adalah korban debt collector bank UOB Buana Indonesia, bedanya bila Irzen Octa meninggal, saya luka parah, tulang mata dan tulang kening retak. Berita mengenai saya ada di http://www.google.com ketik : Nasabah Muji Harjo atau UOB Buana Muji atau debt collector UOB Buana, terima kasih
Saya juga adalah koran debt collector bank UOB Buana Indonesia, bedanya bila Irzen Octa meninggal, saya luka parah, tulang mata dan tulang kening retak. Berita mengenai saya ada di http://www.google.com ketik : Nasabah Muji Harjo atau UOB Buana Muji atau debt collector UOB Buana, terima kasih
Nothing is certain in life but debt and taxes.
Not that I needed another reason not to become a patron of this company.
Like MOMCOM like sun-daughter. No Accountability.
“Same thing happened to a friend of mine in Thailand because he questioned a charge on his Visa card. This was about 15 years ago and it was rumored the royal family controlled many commerce functions. (internet was only in colleges or privileged) He was let go when he agreed not to challenge the charge.”
I lived in Thailand 15 years ago and have been going there for work since ’93. there already were internet cafes. Members of the royal family were major investors in at least one of the big banks. The actual management of the big banks was principally Sino-Thai families and that was who actually made policy. a friend’s brother was Sr VP of one of them. Citi had a small presence with mostly foreign (non-Thai) depositors, but were building a credit card presence..
Remember…. Corporations are people.
I am a person. If I travel to Indonesia, drag someone into a small closet, “interrogate” him for hours, and he dies in my “custody”, I would expect that I would be a risk of being locked up in prison in that country.
So, Citibank is a person, and people who commit serious crimes in most places are sent to prison. How would Citibank be put into prison if it is convicted in this case? Would the top executives serve the sentence for the corporate person? Mitt Romney made the argument recently that the people who make up the corporation (the shareholders) benefit from the corporation’s profits, which I guess makes them liable for its crimes. I guess Mitt Romney would have to agree that all the people who owned stock in Citibank while the alleged crime was being committed would be at risk of ending up in an Indonesian prison.
What about US law? If I, as a person, run an operation of some sort, a guy in Indonesia owes me money, and I have my employees/contractors (“agents”) “interrogate” the debtor to death, wouldn’t I be in violation of a US criminal law? I have to think that if a California drug cartel boss sent thugs to a foreign country where they killed someone who owed the cartel money, that the “crime boss” would be charged in some way in that murder, even though it occurred outside of the US.
(But I’d like to propose a probably better test case: Somewhere in the US, a corporation is probably committing major fraud against someone. As I understand it, there’s a level at which fraud is so serious that the perpetrator is sent to jail in most/all states. I would love to see a local prosecutor who deals with a serous case of fraud by a corporation list that corporation as a “person” in the indictment along with the local individuals who were also involved in the crime(s). I wonder how far that could go?)
The big issue is that this “corporate personhood” in which shareholders gain financially from the actions of the corporation, but that they are shielded from criminal liability for the damages, some times through criminal recklessness or worse, caused by the actions of the corporation. It’s another case of privatizing profits but socializing risk…. Having their cake and eating it too, or, in our current climate, telling us to go eat cake… (Remember how well that turned out…)
Same thing happened to a friend of mine in Thailand because he questioned a charge on his Visa card. This was about 15 years ago and it was rumored the royal family controlled many commerce functions. (internet was only in colleges or privileged) He was let go when he agreed not to challenge the charge.
And there are reports that Verizon has hired Xe (Blackwater) to provide security for their union breaking. Are Multi National Corps out of control? I don’t think regulations are the answer. I favor enforcing the law, a novel concept. Of course as the Casket article shows with enough money companies can write the laws they want.
….or collection agencies….
A bank tortured someone to death? I thought that was the exclusive domain of governments.
C’mon people. They would do it that way here in the good ol’ U S of A if they could get away with it. I knew the Second Amendment might come in handy some day.
Wow! I hope the widow gets her millions. That is a disgusting story.
They take debt owed to another very seriously outside of this country…and this is not at all surprising….