“It turned out that there was nothing to the case.”

Monday, April 30, 2018, 19:48 On Monday, April 30, the approximately 15-year-old minor detained the previous Tuesday on suspicion of damaging Arab property several months previously was released from remand by the Jerusalem Magistrate Court under restrictive conditions. He had been prevented for several days from meeting with an attorney threatened by interrogators and undercover policemen. Honenu Attorney David HaLevi: “It turned out that there was nothing to the case.”
During his remand the minor was threatened by interrogators from the Central Unit of the Jerusalem Police and undercover policemen who attempted to extract a confession from him that he had damaged Arab property. “You won’t be taken out of here alive,” was one of the threats made to him during the days he was under an order prohibiting him from meeting with an attorney.
The minor, who does not have a criminal record, was prohibited from contacting his attorneys and his family from the morning of Thursday, April 26 until the following Saturday night. During that time he was held in the detention center of the Ariel Police Station and placed in a room with adult prisoners who turned out to be undercover policemen, one of whom feigned mental illness. They threatened the minor for many hours, shouting at him that he was suspected of sex offenses and that they intended to injure him if he did not tell them what the crimes were that he had supposedly committed, and thereby clear himself of the suspicion that he was a sex offender. Thus the police attempted to extract from the minor a confession of crimes which he had not committed.
On the afternoon of Friday, April 27, Honenu filed an appeal on the decision by the Jerusalem District Court to reject the appeal which Honenu had filed on the order preventing the minor from meeting with an attorney. Justice Anat Baron rejected the appeal, leaving minor in remand, without meeting with an attorney and without his status being known.
The following Monday, the Jerusalem Magistrate Court ordered the release of the minor from remand under condition of several days of house arrest followed by several days distancing from Yehuda and Shomron.
Honenu Attorney David HaLevi, who represented the minor, stated that, “Today my client, a 15-year-old minor, was released from remand in a manner which supports our claim that this was a false detention. Unfortunately the police in this case took drastic measures, including prohibiting my client from meeting with an attorney. In the end, it turned out that there was nothing to the case.
“I regret the suffering caused to my client due to the hurtful police conduct and the trampling of his rights. We will consider the steps that we take against those responsible for the conduct.”
On Sunday, April 29, at the courthouse, during the wait for the deliberation to begin the police detained the minor’s brother. After a short interrogation on suspicion of obstructing a policeman in the line of duty, he was released.