TO human rights defenders in Indonesia and beyond, 2008 ended on a sour note when a man alleged to have masterminded the murder of a prominent activist walked away free.

Four months after he was charged for the 2004 killing of human rights activist Munir Said Thalib, Muchdi Purwoprandjono, a former deputy chief of Indonesia's National Intelligence Agency (BIN) was released of all charges by an Indonesian court.

The case was deemed a litmus test for Indonesia's commitment to human rights and the rule of law, some 10 years since its birth as a democracy.

Still, mutterings among diplomats and analysts in the weeks before was that Muchdi might go free, as the claims that established his involvment in the case had recently started to look shaky.

For instance, the prosecution had argued that Muchdi had a clear motive to kill Munir, then the head of Kontras (the commission of missing persons and victims of violence). Muchdi had been sacked after a brief stint in a top Army post, after an investigation led by Munir revealed his role in the disappearance of anti-government activists in 1997 and 1998, said the prosecution. But testimonies by two senior military officers went against this claim, while other witnesses for the prosecution had retracted statements given to police during initial investigations.

But hopes were still high among Munir's supporters on Wednesday morning, when around 500 of them gathered in the courthouse compound in South Jakarta over an hour before the session began.

Dressed in red T-shirts that said "Justice for Munir, Justice for All" in Indonesian, women in headscarfs and youth in tight jeans stood side-by-side in the muggy heat, as police officers, in their cursory checks of all those who entered the compound, amassed a collection of water bottles at the front gate.

As 9.30am and the start of the session approached, the police presence increased substantially. Some 400 were dispatched to the site, the Jakarta Post later said. And they were all around. Dressed in their signature mud-brown uniforms, some bore cannisters of tear gas while others inserted themselves in between groups of supporters, watchful of rising tensions.

One officer directed traffic with a loudhailer - a job that mostly consisted of him yelling at minibuses plying the 2-lane street to leave the entrance to the compound clear, instead of offloading passengers there. In a corner of the compound, rows of plastic shields - used by riot police to fend off aggressive crowds - stood ready to be used.

Supporters of Muchdi - a much smaller group - slouched around the entrance of the courthouse. Dressed in blue, they filed into the building early on and occupied a corner of it, waiting for the verdict. Not far from them, more red T-shirt-clad supporters stood silent, bearing placards that read "I love Munir".

It took an hour and a half before chief judge Soeharto came to the verdict. And when he announced that Muchdi was free to go, cheers rang out from one side of the court, while shouts exploded in the rest of the compound. At one point, Munir's supporters surged towards the entrance of the court, while a member of the Solidarity Action Committee for Munir (KASUM) group urged them to stand back. Then, they moved into the carpark of the compound, chanting "Pembunuh, Pembunuh" (killer) and "Pak Munir, siapa yang bunuh! Muchdi" (who killed Munir! Muchdi?).

Yet there was little more they could do, although some 200 of them later took to the Presidential Palace in central Jakarta in protest.

Munir's widow Suciwati summed it up best when she told reporters outside the court that she felt the prosecutors had not been forceful enough in pushing for justice for her husband.

And perhaps, some ordinary Indonesians feel the same way.

 Leaving the courthouse close to noon,The Straits Times reporters bumped into the owner of restaurant specialising in duck dishes down the street.

"What's the verdict? How many years did Muchdi get?" he asked excitedly.

Muchdi is free, came the reply from one of us.

At that, the restaurateur shook his head, threw his hands up in mock despair, and muttered quietly, "How can this be?"