The Central District Attorney's Office (Criminal) filed an appeal to the Central District Court on the lightness of the sentence given in the case of Efi Neve and Bar Katz at the Rishon Lezion Magistrate's Court after their full conviction of all the offenses attributed to them in the indictment filed against them.
The notice of appeal was submitted by attorney Roy Reiss and in it the district court is requested to intervene in the sentence given, which amounted to a suspended sentence and a monetary fine, and to sentence Efi Neve and Bar Katz, in addition, to an actual sentence of actual imprisonment that he would like in the form of community service.
Efi Neve and his partner Bar Katz, in court, photo: Yonatan Shaul
In December 2018, an indictment was filed against Noah and Katz, in which they were charged with two offenses of receiving something fraudulently together and two additional offenses of illegal exit/entry together, for their departure from Israel abroad in September and their illegal and fraudulent re-entry. All this without Schatz identifying himself to the audit the borders, and without her crossing being documented, against the background of a conflict and divorce proceedings between Noah and his separation. The two combined fraud in their actions, to make it easier for them to complete the illegal crossings.
According to the indictment, since its filing, for several years, Noveh and Katz disclaimed criminal responsibility for their actions, and conducted various procedures.
First they resorted to various lengthy preliminary procedures, in which they argued for selective enforcement and consideration of extraneous considerations in their case.
After all these claims were rejected in a number of judicial decisions, they denied the indictment and certain facts attributed to them, raised claims of selective enforcement, extraneous considerations, and conducted their trial to the end.
Entered Israel illegally.
The border crossing in Israel, photo: Ilan Getniu
The verdict given by the Peace Court in Israel rejected all the claims of the defense, accepted all the claims of the prosecution, and convicted Katz and Neve of everything attributed to them.
During the arguments for the punishment, Nove and Katz asked to end the proceedings without a conviction, and alternatively, to settle for a suspended sentence and a monetary fine only.
On the other hand, the attorney's office requested to reject the defense's request, and to serve a prison sentence on Noah and Katz with community service, in addition to a conditional sentence and a monetary fine.
The sentence handed down in their case accepted the position of the prosecutor's office regarding the conviction and left it intact, but as for the punishment, he sentenced Noah Katz to a suspended prison term and a monetary fine only.
According to the notice of appeal filed today by the prosecutor's office, the Court of Appeal erred in issuing this light sentence to Neve and Katz.
decided to appeal the lightness of the sentence.
State Attorney General's Office, photo: Oren Ben Hakon
According to the notice of appeal, the Magistrate's Court erred when it set such a light sentence for the offenses of which Lenva and Katz were convicted. In essence, it states that the sentence handed down by the court is inadequate and insufficient, given the various aggravating circumstances that characterized the case, as it stated itself in the verdict the conviction in their case. These are two separate repeated incidents, and not a one-time trip, when there was a considerable time difference between leaving and entering in which they did not come to their senses but decided to stick to their actions. In addition, the two were convicted of two offenses of fraud, two offenses of illegal entry/exit, four criminal offenses in total The acts were carried out in a joint informed decision, to obtain a benefit that was necessary for them against the background of a personal conflict in which there were data - preventing the documentation of Katz's border crossings.
Therefore, in the appeal filed, the attorney's office asks the district court to make Noah and Katz's punishment worse, and to sentence them to the appropriate punishment that they deserved in the first place: imprisonment with community service, conditional imprisonment, and a fine.
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