ISRAELI STATE PROSECUTION INDICTES U.S. CITIZEN FOR MURDER ON BASIS OF CONFESSIONS

Israeljustice.com

  JERUSALEM -- An American Jewish immigrant, held incommunicado for three weeks, has been indicted for 14 crimes, including two murders and numerous attempted murders, on the basis of what the prosecution admits was mainly his confessions.  
    The State prosecution has admitted that U.S. citizen Yaakov [Jack] Teital was indicted for crimes ranging from the murder of Arabs, fire-bombing monasteries, injuring messianic and left-wing Jews and incitement against homosexuals, mainly on the basis of his confessions. Teital also confessed to the murder of two gay youths at a Tel Aviv night club in August but police said that his alibi was solid and that he was driving a neighbor to give birth in hospital at the time when the gunman opened fire.  
    "From a formal point of view, I will mention that the evidential basis is comprised mainly of statements the respondent made to the police," State Attorney Sagi Ophir told Jerusalem Magistrate Moshe Ravid on Nov. 12.  
    Ophir said that forensic tests supported the confessions although he said that Teital's DNA was found in only one of the areas surrounding the crime scene and he did not mention finger prints.  
    "These [statements or confessions] are reinforced as evidence on the forensic level." Ophir said. "In at least one of the areas the respondent's DNA was found."  
    Ophir did not mention ballistic evidence to support the indictments, specifically a murder weapon, despite the large arsenal of weapons, including nine automatic machine guns and pistols, found on Teital's property in the Jewish community of Shvut Rahel in the northern West Bank.  
    Ravid then ordered that Teital be held until the next court session on Dec. 12.  
    Teital was arrested on Oct. 7 by Israel Security Agency [Shabak] operatives in Jerusalem as he was hanging anti-gay posters. He was then held incommunicado for three weeks and then held over for another week until the State Prosecution indicted him.  
    Teital is being held in an ISA prison and is handcuffed and shackled at his ankles 24 hours a day. Defense Attorney Adi Kedar has petitioned the court to have his client unchained but the ISA said that Teital is a suicide risk. However, a psychiatrist hired by the prosecution to assess Teital said he is fit to stand trial.  
    "All the signs show that my client [Teital] is mentally unstable," Kedar said. "He's convinced he's Gd's emissary. I don't know how real these confessions are."  
    Teital, seen only for the second time since his arrest, made a victory sign outside the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court and said that he was ordered by Gd to commit these crimes.  
    "It was a pleasure and an honor to serve my Gd," Teitel said. "I have no regret and no doubt that Gd is pleased."  
    Teitel told Kedar that he had earlier been contacted by ISA agents who allegedly intended to use him as an informer on Jewish underground activities but he later denied that he had operated as an undercover Shabak agent. ISA officials have since admitted that they tried to recruit Teital.  
    Teitel, 37, a father of four and a website designer has lived in Shvut Rahel since 1997.  
    An official ISA document released on Nov. 1 detailed 14 confessions, including the murder of an Arab taxi driver in Jerusalem on June 8, 1997 and the murder of a Palestinian shepherd next to the Jewish community of Carmel in the southern Hebron Hills on Aug. 3, 1997.  
    Teital confessed to a series of bombings without injuries that included placing four explosives in the Israeli Arab neighborhood of Abu Ghosh outside Jerusalem in 2001, placing a pipe bomb next to the entrance of the home of a Palestinian family in the West Bank village of Sinjal in March 2003 and placing three molotov cocktails near an Arab village between the Samarian Jewish communities of Ariel and Eli in 2004.  
    The ISA reported that Teital confessed to the arson of a forest next to Beit Jamal near Beit Shemesh in central Israel in an effort to set fire to the monastery in the summer of 2005 and he set an explosive next to the Ariel police station on Nov. 2, 2006. According to the report, Teital returned to Beit Jamal on April 20, 2007 to again target the monastery. A Palestinian was injured in the attack.  
    He also confessed to placing a bomb next to a police vehicle in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramot on May 15, 2007 and one month later to placing a roadside bomb near the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood in Jerusalem which he said he detonated next to a police vehicle. No one was injured.  
    Additionally, the ISA report said that Teital confessed to placing an explosive in a Purim gift package at the entrance to the home of a Jewish missionary family in Ariel on March 20, 2008. 15 year-old Ami Ortiz was seriously injured in the attack. Teital also confessed to placing a pipe bomb outside the door of the home of a Jewish left-wing academic in Jerusalem on Sept. 25, 2008. Prof. Zeev Sternhell was lighly injured in the explosion.