Source: Thejakartapost.com.

INDONESIA-JAKARTA – A former student of Airlangga University (Unair) accused of sexually assaulting multiple victims after tricking them into helping him for academic “research” is facing multiple charges at the Surabaya District Court in East Java.

In a hearing held virtually on Wednesday, prosecutors indicted the 22-year-old defendant, identified only as Gilang, with three different charges.

Prosecutor I Gede Willy said Gilang had violated articles 27 and 45 of the 2016 Electronic Information and Transactions (ITE) Law, which prohibits individuals from sharing videos or other electronic information containing extortion or threats.

Gilang was also charged under Article 82 of the 2016 law on child protection for allegedly threatening minors into performing obscene acts and Article 289 of the Criminal Code on obscenity, which carries a maximum sentence of nine years in prison.

The defendant did not file an exception request against the charges.

His case gained nationwide attention in August after several victims took to Twitter to share their alleged accounts of being tricked by Gilang into performing an act referred to as “bondage mummification” under the pretense of academic research.

One user with the handle @m_fikris wrote that he and his friend agreed to participate in his thesis “research” about “wrapping” in July after Gilang persistently begged him, saying he was at risk of failing his studies for not finishing his thesis. The defendant was in his fifth year of university at that time.

Gilang reportedly sent instructions for @m_fikris and his friend to take turns covering each other’s bodies, including their mouths and eyes, with duct tape. He also instructed them to wrap their bodies in jarik (traditional Javanese cloth) and later asked them to record the process and to send him the footage afterward.

Another victim who spoke to The Jakarta Post said that when they were both university freshmen, the defendant had drugged him, covered his entire body with a blanket and groped him when he was sleeping at Gilang’s rooming house after a university event in 2015.

Unair expelled Gilang shortly after the case went viral.

The defendant told police investigators that he had conducted such actions since 2015, claiming that he developed the fetish as a child.(nal)