Teen indicted for murder of twin sister, who was stabbed more than 130 times

The indictment portrays Shiri Sobol, aged 18, as a deeply troubled young woman who exercised complete control over her boyfriend, and manipulated him into murdering her twin sister.

By BEN HARTMAN
Updated: MARCH 18, 2016 00:14
Scene of stabbing attack in Tel Aviv (photo credit: POLICE SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)
Scene of stabbing attack in Tel Aviv
(photo credit: POLICE SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)
An 18-year-old boy stabbed a teenage girl more than 130 times outside her family home last month, all while his accomplice – the victim’s twin sister – watched him carry out the murder they planned, according to an indictment issued on Thursday.
Despite the young age of the killer, David Eran, the murder of Hili Sobol on February 18 showed an almost subhuman brutality. According to details of the autopsy presented in the indictment, Eran stabbed Hili more than 130 times across her entire body, including more than 30 times in the neck.
According to the indictment, during the murder in the stairwell of the Sobol family’s apartment building, Hili’s sister Shiri stood in the doorway of the family home watching her boyfriend murder her twin sister, while she was on the line with an emergency dispatch operator.
Over the course of the nine-minute conversation, Shiri told the operator that an unknown man – probably an Arab – arrived without warning and began stabbing her sister outside their house.
She kept to the same story after police arrived, even as it began to fall apart within minutes.
After the murder, Eran allegedly went inside the apartment and changed into clothes he had brought in a backpack and cleaned his hands with wet wipes provided by Shiri, who then stashed the clothes and the two knives Eran used for the murder. Shiri then had Eran hide in her mother’s bedroom, and took the doorknob off the door to deter police from entering, according to the indictment.
While police were searching the apartment and questioning Shiri, she sent text messages to Eran as part of an effort to get their stories straight, the indictment said.
When police finally did force their way into the room and found Eran, Shiri’s first words were, “I didn’t do anything, what, do you think me and David planned to murder her?” according to the indictment.
Eran confessed to at least one police officer that he committed the murder and described how he did it. Just before his first court appearance, he also allegedly told two separate prisoners in the Prisons Service van with him that he killed Hili, and that he and Shiri had been planning the murder for months.
Not long after the crime, police searching the Sobol family home found the gloves worn by Eran during the killing, both of which were covered in his blood. Within a week, police found both of the knives they say were used in the murder, which Shiri had allegedly stashed in the apartment before police arrived at the scene.
The indictment portrays Shiri Sobol, 18, as a deeply troubled young woman who exercised complete control over her boyfriend, manipulating him into murdering her twin, with whom she had violently feuded for years.
Shiri and Hili had for years experienced a violent sibling rivalry “which created in Shiri a powerful hatred of the deceased,” according to the indictment.
Hili was previously indicted for assaulting her mother and Shiri, and subsequently sent to a disciplinary center, the indictment said.
Shiri and Eran had been dating for more than two years when the murder happened.
Their relationship “was defined by the fact that Shiri exercised a great deal of influence over him and knew that he would do whatever she asked of him, whatever it took to satisfy her and sustain their romantic connection,” the indictment reads.
From July 2015 until the day of the murder, Shiri repeatedly sent text messages to Eran in which she expressed her frustration and fears about Hili returning to live at the family home in Tel Aviv, as well as her wish that her twin sister would die.
“I wish she would die,” she wrote in one text, and in a later missive, “if only an Arab or a terrorist would stab her.”
In another text message, she told Eran that Hili was forcing her to break up with him and date other men and that if she didn’t, Hili would have her friends cause him harm.
“By writing this, she planted in David the desire and need to kill the deceased, so that she would stop harassing and destroying Shiri’s life and harming the romantic relationship between them,” the indictment states.
The two alleged co-conspirators had planned the murder on two separate occasions over the months prior, but were only able to put the plan into motion on February 18, again according to the indictment. The plan was also traced through the text messages sent between the two defendants that same afternoon.
Both suspects were charged with murder in the first degree and obstruction of justice at the Tel Aviv District Court on Thursday. Both have denied the charges against them and the police contention they had previously confessed.