The cover-up police
by aletho
The Shay Police Unit manage to avoid basic investigative actions – even while holding two suspects caught red-handed in custody
By Yossi Gurvitz | Yesh Din | December 29, 2013
On July 26th,
2010, Israeli civilians – some of whom were seen coming from the
direction of the settlements of Yizhar and Har Bracha – went on two
rampages in the Palestinian village of Burin. In the first and more
severe case, they attacked and destroyed property; when the owner,
Ibrahim Eid, could no longer stand watching his property go up in flames
and approached the scene, they hit him over the head with an iron bar.
Eid lost consciousness and had to be treated in a hospital.
During
the second rampage, Israeli civilians stoned the nearby home of Bashir
Hamza Zaban. Unfortunately for the hoodlums, border policemen were on
the scene and spotted them. The cops chased the attackers, detaining two
of them. One of the detainees chose to hide a knife in his shoe. The
two refused to identify themselves, but later were identified in the
police station. The two maintained their right to remain silent during
their interrogation. Zaban also managed to identify a third attacker,
who – unlike the detainees – was not hooded.
On
its face, this is an open and shut case. Yet lo and behold: even though
two suspects were arrested, having been caught red-handed; even though
one of them was carrying a concealed knife; and even though they refused
to identify themselves – the police wouldn’t do the bare minimum, i.e.
ask the victim to identify his attackers. Instead, the police closed the
case, citing lack of evidence.
Hold
on, the epic screw-up of this case is just beginning. Despite the fact
that Zaban noted in his statement to the police that he was aware of the
attack on Eid, and although he gave the police a disc containing photos
of the attack on Eid, the police took their sweet time and summoned Eid
for a statement in November of 2010, a mere five months after the
incident. After all, we all know that the memory of witnesses just
improves as time passes by.
We’re
not done yet: Eid, in his statement to the police, noted the existence
of the disc, containing quite clear images of the Israeli civilians who
attacked him, who can be easily identified. Even so, the police – who
had had the disc since July – didn’t bother summoning him to a lineup so
he could point out his attackers; hence, it naturally did not summon
any of them for an interrogation. And to top it all off, the police
closed the case in December 2012 – after two years and five months of
doing little investigative work – but only bothered to inform us, who
represent the victims, in August 2013.
Such phenomenal incompetence, which would not surprise anyone familiar with the SJPD
('Samaria and Judea' Police Department), generally has two plausible
explanations. The first is that the cops and their superiors are
complete failures at their duties. The second is that they’re not that
dumb, in fact they’re quite smart: we can assume they have a good reason
to believe that if they do their jobs properly, they will be harmed.
Some of them, after all, live among the population they’re charged with
investigating. So they do a half-assed job, ignore evidence, silence
nasty questions, and bullshit their way through the closing of a case,
hoping no one pays attention.
Such
a police force is the hallmark of dark regimes. The SJPD has been
functioning this way for years. Anyone who thinks that these
investigators, when re-posted within Israel proper, will not retain the
work norms developed beyond the 'separation' wall, is deluding herself.
As for us, once we lifted our jaws off the floor, we appealed the
decision to close this case. We hope that the embarrassing negligence of
the SJPD will force the prosecution to act. We’ll keep you informed.
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