Jerusalem police arrested five men on Thursday morning who allegedly belong to
the Yitzhak Abergil organized crime ring.
The men are suspected of
conspiring to commit a crime and possessing deadly weapons. According to the
suspects, they were planning to take revenge on a Jerusalem resident, who owed
the group money. The resident was known to police from previous
incidents.
The suspects followed the advice of Abergil, who is currently
incarcerated in the US, of hiding weapons in public buildings so as to deflect
any suspicion from the group.
Two days ago, police discovered a weapons
cache, including guns and bullets, inside a storage room in an apartment
building on Hebron Road in Jerusalem.
Parents of one of the suspects live
in the building.
Upon further searches of the suspects’ homes, police
discovered ceramic bulletproof vests that had bullet holes and other signs of
violence.
Police suspect that the crime ring had planned to carry out a
major attack in the near future.
The suspects were remanded on Thursday
afternoon in the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court until next Tuesday.
Yitzhak
Abergil and his brother Meir, two of Israel’s most notorious crime bosses, were
extradited to the US on January 13, 2011, to stand trial on charges that include
ordering a murder, money-laundering, extortion and dealing the drug Ecstasy.
|