GSS detainee denied right to meet with attorney for 8 days

Monday, May 26, 2014, 10:16 The draconian treatment of suspects in “Price Tag” cases continues. GSS interrogators extended by three additional days the order denying a 19-year-old resident of the Shomron his right to meet with an attorney. The youth was detained on Wednesday, May 21 by the GSS on suspicion of involvement with “Price Tag” incidents.
On the night of Sunday, May 25 GSS investigators informed Honenu attorney Yossi Lin, who is representing the detainee, that the order barring the detainee from meeting with an attorney has been extended for a second time, until Wednesday, May 28 at night. Also the GSS and police investigators are refusing to inform Lin of the charges against the detainee.
On Sunday, May 25 at the Petah Tikva Magistrate Court the remand of the detainee was extended until Wednesday, May 28. Honenu filed two appeals. Honenu attorney Naftali Wertzberger filed an appeal with the Jerusalem District Court on the order banning the detainee from meeting with an attorney. Honenu attorney Yossi Lin filed an appeal with the Lod District Court on the remand extension.
“In my opinion preventing a meeting between a detainee and his attorney on various pretexts of needs for the investigation constitutes a serious violation of the rights of a suspect, and has only one aim – breaking the spirit of the suspect so that he will admit to the charges against him, whether or not he committed a crime,” said Honenu attorney Yossi Lin in response to the extension of the ban on meeting with an attorney.
“It is unthinkable that suspects of crimes several times more serious – murder, rape, mugging an elderly woman, stabbings in nightclubs etc. – are allowed to consult with an attorney during the course of an investigation, and their rights are preserved as is worthy in a democratic state, whereas suspects associated with a particular political group have their rights rudely trampled, on the grounds of various and strange baseless claims.”
On Monday, May 26 at 15:00 an 18-year-old detained by the GSS on Sunday, May 11 will be brought to a deliberation at the district court. On Sunday, May 25 his remand was extended until Tuesday, May 27. Honenu attorney Adi Kedar, who is representing the detainee, filed an appeal with the Lod District Court on the remand extension.
For 11 days the detainee was denied the right to meet with an attorney. He also was subjected to severe physical and psychological abuse including interrogation for 21 hours a day, also on Shabbat. During one interrogation he was choked by an interrogator after he dozed off. During another he fainted after an interrogator screamed in his ear after he dozed off. A medic was rushed in to treat him.
Honenu reports that to this day the detainee’s attorney has not been informed of the charges against his client.

Update: The 18-year-old has been released.

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