Fe: Perth businessman among Jakarta bomb blast dead
Fri Jul 17 20:38:26 EST 2009
PERTH, July 17 AAP - Perth businessman Nathan Verity is one of the eight people killed in the Jakarta bomb blasts, a friend and business colleague says.
Jim Truscott, a former SAS soldier, said Mr Verity, 38, was a devoted family man who had run a human resources and recruitment business out of Jakarta.
Mr Truscott said that as the head of his own company, Truscott Crisis Leaders, he had worked in partnership with Mr Verity for the past five years.
Mr Verity lived in Perth with his wife Vanessa and five-year-old son, and had only travelled to Jakarta earlier this week, Mr Truscott said.
"His home base was Perth," Mr Truscott said.
"He only lived in Jakarta for work. He would spend a couple of weeks in Jakarta and couple of weeks here."
Mr Truscott said he had not learnt how Mr Verity had died but said his body had been found amid the rubble of one of the bomb blasts that struck the Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels in Jakarta's upmarket Mega Kuningan business district about 8am local time (1100 AEST).
"We don't know at all exactly (how he died) other than his body's intact and he must have been killed by a blast," Mr Truscott said.
He said Mr Verity's wife Vanessa and his father Peter were distraught.
"They'll go up tonight and hopefully identify the body tomorrow morning and bring him home," he said.
Mr Truscott said he formed his own company in 2000 and linked up with Verity about five years ago.
"We worked together and I worked personally with Nathan," he said.
"We have shared many beers together since.
"He was certainly a man who cared for his family.
"I just feel like going out and killing terrorists.
"In my first career I was in the Australian SAS. I spent most of my first career perfecting how to kill these people.
"I feel inclined now to carry on and do so."
The Verity website describes it as "a professional search and selection company and recruitment consultancy formed in Australia and Indonesia ..."
It says the company deals with its clients by integrating professional ethics, customer service, achievement, teamwork and life balance.
"Our success has been built upon the recognition that every client and candidate has unique challenges, circumstances and specific needs," the website says.