Haredim clash with police (illustration)
Haredim clash with police (illustration)Flash 90

Jerusalem Magistrate Court Judge Yaron Mientkavich on Thursday acquitted Aharon Grauman Halevi, a haredi man who took part in a demonstration at the intersection of Yehezkel and Shmuel Hanavi streets in Jerusalem last March, on charges of assaulting a policewoman.

The indictment alleges that Grauman Halevi hit the policewoman on her back several times with his fist, and when the policewoman could not get away from him, her fellow officers restrained him and took him into custody.

In court, the policewoman who Halevi allegedly attacked and her four fellow policemen claimed that he would have continued his attack if they had not intervened to stop him.

Two witnesses added to the accusations against Halevi. One witness said that Halevi had kicked the policewoman. The other witness claimed that Halevi was in a bloodthirsty rage and that if he had not rescued her from Halevy she would have still been in the hospital today.

However, the judge rejected the testimony in light of the video of the incident presented in court. "The only contact between the defendant and the policewoman was that he pushed her hand - and does not resemble [testimony] of the prosecution witnesses: there were no punches to the back, no punches to the head, no kicking or spitting. To say that none of the police officers rescued the policewoman from the defendant's hands, because there was no need to rescue her. The policewoman knocked the defendant to the ground and only afterwards did the police reach him, beat him, and arrested him."

In the verdict, the judge harshly attacked the policemen's conduct and their testimonies. "I saw no alternative from the difficult but obvious conclusion that the testimonies of the five policemen before me were not true."

At the end of the verdict, the judge further noted that only the existence of the video saved Halevy from a guilty verdict and a harsh sentence.