Arrest made in murder of mob prince

Police nab Michael Levy, 29, for killing of Shay Shirazi last week.

By BEN HARTMAN
A FORENSICS OFFICER examines the car in Tel Aviv in which mob prince Shay Shirazi was shot to death by a rival mob’s hit man last week. (photo credit: FLASH90)
A FORENSICS OFFICER examines the car in Tel Aviv in which mob prince Shay Shirazi was shot to death by a rival mob’s hit man last week.
(photo credit: FLASH90)
Barely a week after an underworld heir was gunned down in north Tel Aviv, a Netanya man was arrested on suspicion of killing Shay Shirazi, the son of Netanya mob boss Rico Shirazi, as part of a feud between the two.
Hours after the murder last Saturday night, investigators began to hone in on Michael Levy, 29, a Netanya man who was known to have a feud with the younger Shirazi.
Though in the days after the killing there was widespread belief that Shay was murdered as part of a underworld war between his father and his rivals, Levy’s arrest indicates police believe the killing may have been a small-scale feud between Shay and Levy, or people close to him.
A police official said Sunday night that Levy is “connected to local criminal elements” in Netanya, but is not a member of any criminal organization.
A gag order remains on all details of the case, beyond the fact that Levy is under arrest.
At the Rishon Lezion Magistrate’s Court on Monday, Levi’s attorney, Erez Abuhav, said his client denies any connection to the murder, and suggested “we all wait patiently and give police time to finish the case.”
Though he was the son of one of Israel’s most wellknown crime figures, Shay Shirazi was rather well-liked and was not known for waging any wars with underworld rivals or leaving bodies in the streets of central Israel. When he was shot dead last Saturday night, he was stopped at a traffic light on Moshe Sneh Street in north Tel Aviv, without a bodyguard.
His passenger, an older acquaintance who police said is not an underworld figure, was also shot and lightly wounded.
Rico Shirazi has for years been a major player in the underworld in Netanya and beyond, and became a celebrity of sorts due to his flashy lifestyle and the larger-than-life persona he played up in his rare appearances before the media. He was also known in later years for his alliance with southern Israel mob kingpin Shalom Domrani and his blood feud with the Abutbul crime family from Netanya.
Shay is one of the more prominent underworld figures to be murdered in recent years, one of the well-known “mob princes” in Israel – a generation of young heirs like Shay Shirazi, Dror Alperon, and Nissim Domrani, among others, who were born into underworld fame without having to work their way up from the street like their fathers.
The elder Shirazi, who in his younger days played for Maccabi Netanya FC, was sentenced in December 2015 to eight year in prison for money- laundering, fraud, and NIS 25 million in tax crimes. After he was told – in his cell in isolation at Rimonim Prison – that his only son had been murdered, Shirazi submitted a request to attend the funeral and Shiva, but was denied due to public safety concerns.
The Israel Prisons Service said in a statement last week that they would let him attend the gravesite prayers on the 30th day after the murder.
A police investigations official said Monday that investigators are treating Levi’s arrest as just an initial development in the case, and do not consider it closed.