Police arrested a 34-year-old resident of the Arab village of Jatt, in the
Sharon region, on Tuesday on suspicion of raping a woman whom he gave a ride in
2006.
The arrest was possible thanks to a DNA sample that the Prisons
Service recently took from the suspect while he was in custody over an unrelated
offense of violent assault, police said.
Six years ago, the woman, a
34-yearold Rishon Lezion resident, hitched a ride with a man after leaving a
nightclub.
The driver suddenly swerved off the main road, assaulted and
raped her while threatening violence, before throwing her out of the vehicle and
fleeing the scene.
Police took the rapist’s DNA sample and stored it on a
national database at Jerusalem police national headquarters.
Meanwhile,
in recent weeks, police arrested the suspect for alleged violent assault, and
the Prisons Service took a sample of his DNA, as is standard
procedure.
Forensic officers at the police lab matched the sample to the
2006 rape, but the results came back after the suspect had been released from
custody.
“We declared him an individual wanted for questioning,” a Tel
Aviv Police spokeswoman said.
On Monday, Border Police officers in Hadera
randomly stopped the man for a check. His name instantly appeared on the police
computer as a wanted individual, and officers arrested him.
The man told
police during questioning that he’d had nothing to do with the 2006
rape.
“Nevertheless, we know it’s him,” the spokeswoman said.
The
case is part of a growing number of previously unsolved crimes that have
recently seen breakthroughs due to the practice of taking DNA samples from
prisoners, which have linked them to past offenses.