Detainee awarded 12,250 NIS compensation

Thursday, March 22, 2018, 15:30 In a civil suit, Ramleh Magistrate Court Judge Noam Raf awarded 12,250 NIS compensation to a young man illegally detained for interrogation by the police. “The conduct by the police brought about a violation of the dignity and freedom of the complainant illegally and contrary to the provisions of the Basic Law of Human Dignity and Freedom,” ruled Judge Raf in his verdict. At the time of the detention, the complainant was sleeping in an apartment in Yad Binyamin with other youths, among them a youth against whom there is an outstanding order forbidding him to make contact with numerous specific individuals, among them the complainant.
In his verdict Judge Raf ruled that the police detained the complainant in order to bring him to the police station as a suspect, and held him unnecessarily for seven hours, despite the fact that there were no charges against him. Judge Raf also ruled that contrary to the attempts by the police to portray the complainant as uncooperative, the evidence proves that he did cooperate under interrogation, replied to the questions by the interrogator and also signed on his own recognizance for release.
Additionally, Judge Raf leveled criticism at the conduct of the Public Complaints Officer, who replied to the complaint filed by the complainant that he was suspected of abetting the violation of a legal order. Judge Raf noted that not at any stage was the complainant suspected of such and that the claim, “is completely baseless and is not in accordance with the documents [in the case].”
Judge Raf also leveled criticism at the conduct of the police for placing the complainant and the youth who is forbidden to make contact with him in the same cell at the police station, despite the order outstanding against him.
Honenu Attorney Menasheh Yado, who represented the complainant: “My client was detained for seven hours, interrogated and forced to sign on his own recognizance for violating an order, when all of the policeman were aware that no order had been issued against him. The Public Complaints Officer at the Israeli Police evaded his complaint. However the court accepted the suit and obligated the police to pay 12,250 NIS in compensation, and leveled sharp criticism at the police and at the reply by the Public Complaints Officer, which contradicted the documents held by the police themselves.”