Police in East Java's Tulungagung Investigates Seven Air Rifle Assemblers

Tulungagung, E Java (Antara) - The police force in East Java's Tulungagung district had asked its officers to probe seven air rifle assemblers for allegedly having no permits. "I instructed all the intelligent officers and the police precinct personnel on Thursday to investigate a number of air rifle assemblers," chief of the district police Adj. Snr. Comr. Whisnu Hermawan Februanto said on Friday. The police had tightened its surveillance of the air rifle assemblers after it was discovered that replicas of SP-1 rifles from Tulungagung were delivered to Aceh province, he noted. If the air rifle assemblers did not hold a production permit they may be brought to justice according to Law No. 5/1984 on industry, he added. The delivery of 120 replicas of air rifles packed in wood boxes reading "spare parts of motor vehicles" through a post office in Medan, capital of the North Sumatra province, had prompted the police force and the military to conduct an in-depth investigation of the case, he said. "We will investigate the case to check whether the assemblers abused their permits, or the rifles were produced illegally," he remarked. The police force had named Purwa Priswanto, owner of the plant producing the replica of the rifles, as a suspect for allegedly violating article 45 of the Law No. 5/1984 on industry. If found guilty, Purwa can be sentenced to up to five years in jail. (*) Reporting by Slamet Agus Sudarmojo