The Committee for the Advancement of Women and Gender Equality, chaired by MK Oded Forer, convenes today (Monday) to discuss the State Attorney’s Office’s policy of plea bargains for domestic violence offenses. “When they start negotiating a plea deal with the victim, there is no opinion on the matter,” Iscove said. “If the prosecution and the defense agree to the punishment, the deal will be signed. No one will ask my opinion.”
In her opening remarks, Iscove thanked the chair of the committee and said: “Thank you Oded, you visited me at the hospital and promised my mother that she would enact a law to deny guardianship. We were skeptical but you kept your promise. “Thanks to you, the law for taking custody of a parent who tried to murder has passed, and I thank you.”
“I did not expect the trial against Aviad who tried to murder me to reach a plea agreement,” Iscove said. “In my case, I and the lawyers are in a good relationship. They share with me the legal process. At the same time, a change must be made here. When negotiations for a plea deal for the victim begin, there is no opinion on the matter. If the prosecution and the defense agree to the deal, the deal is signed. No one will ask my opinion. Just so we’ll have to accept it and it’s not acceptable. The fear that the victim will fear in X years that he will be released does not matter to anyone. What will happen then. Who will protect. Which discourages women from relying on the justice system instead of being of help to them. Victims of an offense must be allowed to agree to a plea deal, so that you feel safe and not against it“.
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Iscove added that “his defense attorney does not think it is going to make my life any easier. He will interrogate me on every detail about or an evening character where my husband tried to murder me. I ask regardless of why it has to go through this over and over again. I gave testimony to the police. To the researcher. Why this time again one has to go through an investigation into painful things. Why do I need to see the man who tried to murder me again? Reluctantly I became a symbol of struggle. I sincerely hope that we will succeed in eradicating this horrific phenomenon of violence. And we can see an end to it. “
Shira Isakov in a discussion on plea bargains in domestic violence in the Committee on the Status of Women in the Knesset. Photo: Knesset Channel
The committee’s chairman, MK Oded Forer, said at the beginning of the hearing: “We read about the State Attorney’s Office’s intention to reach a plea agreement in Shira Isakov’s case. This issue lit a red light for us to discuss in principle plea agreements in domestic violence.”
MK Avigdor Lieberman said: “The issue is puzzling and unexplained. I am not a lawyer but yesterday I picked up the phone to one of the leading lawyers in the country and asked to hear his opinion on this attempt by the State Attorney’s Office to reach a plea agreement. I wrote verbatim: “Someone in the prosecution went out of his way to get on well with the killer.” There is no explanation as to why a plea deal must be reached when all the witnesses are alive and can give primary testimony. This gives those who tried to murder an option to be a guardian over their children and blackmail the victim. It is doubtful whether such a plea deal will stand in the High Court, the lawyer told me. “This is a strange thing and seems clearly unreasonable.”
Oded Forer at a discussion in the Committee for the Advancement of Women (Photo: Yaniv Nadav)A representative of the State Attorney’s Office, Adv. Tony Goldenberg of the Tel Aviv District Attorney’s Office, said: “I know all the murder cases and attempted murders that are being conducted in the country. I am glad that in the public there is a growing public interest in the phenomenon of domestic violence. We there always accompany the victims of the crime and their families from the opening of the investigation to the prosecution. They are full partners in contacts for plea bargains. I do not want to get into Shira Iscove’s portfolio. From what I know in my professional estimation in this case there will be no plea agreement! Did not get off offense of attempted murder. There is no connection between the publications that were in reality. “
Representative of the State Attorney’s Office on the policy of plea bargains in domestic violence cases, following the case of Shira Isakov (Photo: Knesset Channel)
Forer asked: “We know that seventy percent of cases are closed in plea bargains. What considerations are you going to plea bargain and what is the place given to the victim?”. Lieberman added: “We can only rely on an official response from a Justice Department spokesman. You say there is no chance of a plea bargain here and there will be no facilitative approach. We see an official response from a Justice Department spokesman who has not denied going into a plea deal.” MK Katie Sheetrit: “The public is fed up with plea bargains with people who are most likely to try to murder again.”
The prosecutor replied: “I say unequivocally. I do not know the speaker’s response. As far as I have heard we have denied the publications. In my professional opinion this case will not end in a plea bargain. This is an offense that I understand the evidence can be proved.” Goldenberg added: “In Tel Aviv there is one attempted murder case. In the south 2. In the center one and in Jerusalem one. Everyone is in court. There is no plea agreement in anyone. Sometimes we stand by our position that can be proven despite court pressure. Only if we can not prove “We are moving away from a serious intention to commit murder. There is no such animal that we can reach a plea agreement without hearing the victim’s position.”
Committee for the Advancement of Women (Photo: Yaniv Nadav)
Avigdor Lieberman in committee discussion (Photo: Yaniv Nadav)
Lieberman at a discussion in the Committee for the Advancement of Women (Photo: Yaniv Nadav)Last week, a public outcry broke out after it became known that the prosecution was in talks with Moshe, and more than 25,000 people signed a petition expressing strong opposition to a plea deal between the parties. “An entire country was shocked by the unimaginable violence and attempted murder,” the petition read, “miraculously, Iscove survived and told the horrors of that day. A plea deal is a sin of crime and proof that nothing has changed and that there is no deterrence for violent men. “We will be silent. They say enough violence against women. We are all with poetry.”
The committee’s chairman, MK Oded Forer, reacted sharply to the reports and tweeted: “Plea deal? Are you off track? This is a difficult case, without a doubt, in which the man tried to slaughter Shira. Where does the prosecution intend to go towards him? “.