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Doli Syarief Pulungan, 58, was in the Cashton area in September looking for scopes with infrared capabilities that could be used with M-16 and AR-15 rifles. Apparently believing a complete U.S. arms embargo was still in effect for Indonesia, Pulungan contacted Steve Kaczik, the Norwalk-Wilton police chief, who also is a licensed firearms dealer, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Meredith Duchemin.
Pulungan offered Kaczik $300 over list price for each Leupold Mark 4 CQ-T tactical scope, planning to ship them to Saudi Arabia and then Indonesia for sale to the Indonesian army, Duchemin said.
At trial earlier this year, Pulungan testified he didn’t know the scopes were considered munitions under federal law, making them unlawful to export without a license from the U.S. State Department. He also didn’t know that the United States had dropped the arms embargo against Indonesia in 2004, Duchemin said.
Pulungan’s attorney, Christopher Kelly, asked District Judge Barbara Crabb to make his client’s sentence equal to the 10 months he already has served in jail since his arrest in September. In that time, Pulungan’s health has deteriorated, and he has had little contact with family and faces deportation upon completion of his sentence.
Kelly also asked Crabb to shorten Pulungan’s sentence based on the lack of harm to U.S. security interests he posed since the scopes weren’t weapons of mass destruction and he intended to sell them to the Indonesian military, not a terrorist organization.
Duchemin disagreed, saying any violation of the export license act posed a threat to U.S. armed forces overseas.
Crabb, who could have sentenced Pulungan to 6½ years in prison, said the four-year sentence reflected the relative risk he posed to the United States.
Pulungan had run a successful import-export business, served on a Indonesian board that regulated the aviation industry, and had been in Cashton trying purchase rebuilt aircraft service equipment for an Indonesian airline before contacting Kaczik about the scopes, Kelly said.
