Israel’s War Against Palestine: Documenting the Military Occupation of Palestinian and Arab Lands

Palestinian cleared of rape charges: The police treated us like dogs

31 March 2011

Four Palestinians released after being accused of rape, sexual abuse by 11-year-old boy from Bnei Brak; one of the men tells Army Radio that police beat them and didn’t tell them allegations against them.

IOA Editor: Israeli justice at work.



By Haaretz Service, Haaretz – 31 March 2011
www.haaretz.com/news/national/palestinian-cleared-of-rape-charges-the-police-treated-us-like-dogs-1.353289

Four Palestinians released after being accused of rape, sexual abuse by 11-year-old boy from Bnei Brak; one of the men tells Army Radio that police beat them and didn’t tell them allegations against them.

Four Palestinians who were arrested on suspicion of raping and sexually abusing an 11-year-old boy from Bnei Brak were released Wednesday night after it was found that the child had falsely accused the men.

The Palestinians claimed that they had never met the boy and had no connection to him.

“The police treated us like dogs, not like human beings,” one of the Palestinians told Army Radio in an interview on Thursday. “On Monday, the other three and I went to sleep around midnight. At 3 A.M. we heard someone trying to break the door to the apartment, and when we went to open it they sat us down on the floor and started beating us,” he recounted. “They tied our hands and legs, covered our eyes, and took our identification.”

According to police officials, the boy was apparently superficially acquainted with the Palestinian men, and after his relatives discovered this he fabricated the abuse story due to embarrassment.

Only after the Palestinians were taken to a court hearing on the extension of their remand after they were arrested on Tuesday, the boy underwent an investigation wherein he eventually confessed that he had fabricated the entire story.

The Palestinian said that the police broke the furniture in the apartments, and took their cell phones and laptops without even telling them the allegations against them.

“We were told we raped a boy and abused him, and I was in shock. I felt as though I was in a dream that I want to wake up from,” the Palestinian told Army Radio.

“When the investigation ended, they just dropped us off at a checkpoint and we had to walk in our slippers and night clothes all the way home. Even this morning, after I was released, I still didn’t understand all the suspicions against me.”

The police said in response, “The officers acted in a professional, efficient, and quick manner.” According to the police, the four Palestinians were released when it was found that they did not commit the crimes attributed to them.

On Tuesday, the child’s school informed his older brother that his behavior had recently changed and that they had noticed marks on his body.

The brother filed a complaint with the police who opened an investigation, during which the child testified that during the past two months he had been abused by the four men who work in an events hall in central Israel.

The four allegedly encouraged him to go to their apartment in the city in return for sweets and money. The child also claimed that the four allegedly raped him and abused him repeatedly.

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