Ahmad Suradji

"Sorcerer"

"All I wanted to do was to
improve my healing ability" -Ahmad Suradji

+He was a respected "sorcerer" in the small village of Medan at Sumatra, Indonesia. In Indonesia, consulting mystic doctors is a way of living. A lot of people visit the doctors because they think the doctors have paranormal powers, and ask them for medical and spiritual advise. A lot of woman sought the doctor's help believing they would make themselves richer, healthier and more sexually attractive to their husbands or boyfriends.

+Consulting mystics is a way of life in Indonesia, and they are reputed to have huge sexual appetites. There have been other cases of mystics molesting and even raping their clients.

+The sorcerer was revered by locals who believed he had paranormal powers, and often asked him for medical and spiritual advice. Many women would hire him to cast magic spells to ensure the faithfulness of their husbands or boyfriends. Neighbors said that many women sought the sorcerer's help believing they would make themselves richer, healthier and more sexually attractive to men. Police believe the victims -- whose ages ranged from 11 to 30 -- may have been too embarrassed to tell their families of their seeking the sorcerer's help so their disappearances were not linked to him. A large amount of them were also prostitutes.

+After charging each victim $200 to $400, he would take them to a sugarcane plantation near his home and bury them in the ground up to their waist as part of a ritual. Once in the ground he strangled each woman with electrical cable. Then he drank their saliva, undressed their corpses and reburied them with their heads pointing to his home so to enhance his magical powers. Suradji told police that nine years ago he had a dream in which the ghost of his father told him to kill 70 women and drink their saliva so he could become a dukan, or mystic healer, he said.

+When a girl who had visited Suradji didn't return, the father reported the disappearance of his daughter. When the police went to Suradji's house, they found the body of one of the victims in a field close to his house.

+A search of Ahmad's property revealed clothes and watches belonging to 25 missing women. After the police arrested Suradji on May 2, 1997, he initially confessed the killing of 16 women over a five-year period. But under further questioning, he confessed to have killed 42 woman, ranging in ages from 11 to 30 years, over a period of 11 years. Ahmad's three wives, all sisters, were also arrested for helping him commit the murders and hide the corpses. The oldest wife, Tumini, was tried as his accomplice in his 11-year rampage. The other two wives has left the village.

+The sorcerer was said to be widely respected in his village. Neighbours said he was often willing to help sick villagers and contribute to charitable causes. Nasib, who led police to the bodies in the field next to his home, told officers he needed to kill up to 70 women to gain supernatural powers. Now that the unearthing of 40 corpses testify to Nasib's true mania, police have asked local residents to report any more missing women and children. About 80 families in the area have reported female relatives missing, leading to fears that more bodies could be uncovered.

+During their trials both Suradji and Tumini denied the slayings, saying they confessed because they could no longer bear torture by interrogators. On April 27, 1998, an Indonesian court in North Sumatra found the sorcerer guilty of Indonesia's worst killing spree. As the last of the 42 bodies was being unearthed, the deadly sorcerer was sentenced to death by firing squad and executed shortly after the sentence was handed down.

+"The case of Achmad Suradji is an aberration," says a traditional healer, who is visited by many for his supposedly magic powers.

"If you don't have the right background, the right education, or the right teacher, then things could go badly wrong."

+Some mystics say they can arrange to have people killed by magic powers. But people in Mr Suradji's village say that the allegations about him have put them off from seeing mystics, and that they will now stay clear of traditional sorcery.

+As one of Mr Suradji's neighbours says, they feel betrayed by a man who was once a respected member of the community.

+Speaking to reporters in Medan, Suradji seemed less perturbed by the prospect of being executed than by his incomplete agenda. "The target was 70" he admitted.