A prisoner who is serving a double life sentence for two homicides is claiming
to know the burial spot of a missing IDF soldier and has offered to draw a map
of the body’s location in exchange for money.
The bizarre episode began
several months ago, when the prisoner, Mordechai Moshe, convicted of murdering
one man over a financial dispute and a neighbor he suspected of stealing from
him, turned to two fellow prisoners at the maximum security Shatta prison near
Beit She’an, in the North, with an unusual offer.
Moshe, who is appealing
his conviction at the High Court of Justice, told Amos Nahum, convicted of
murder, and Elias Dali, convicted of international narcotics smuggling, that he
could help set them free by passing them information on the burial spot of the
Druse- Israeli soldier Majdi Halabi, who went missing from his town of Daliat
al- Carmel in 2005.
According to the agreement between the prisoners, the
two prisoners would pass on Moshe’s information to the state and would demand to
be pardoned in exchange.
“Moshe realized he could not receive a pardon in
exchange for the information because of the severity of his sentence, but he
asked the two prisoners for tens of thousands of shekels to hire a private
lawyer,” Boaz Kenig, a Tel Aviv-based criminal attorney who is representing all
three prisoners, told The Jerusalem Post.
Moshe had been represented by a
public defender until then, and could not afford a private attorney.
All
three prisoners then met with Kenig and his partner, Shai Shaked, at his Ramat
Gan office to draw up the details of the offer to the state.
“One of the
prisoners got a special holiday to visit me,” Kenig said, noting the seriousness
with which authorities were treating the claim.
State prosecutors agreed
to the offer.
Asked if he was convinced Mordechai did indeed know the
whereabouts of the soldier’s body, the attorney said it was not his job to know
one way or the other, adding that he represented felons as part of his
profession. Nevertheless, he added, “my intuition says there is something to
this [claim].”
Moshe has not indicated how he came to know the
information he claims to possess.
State prosecutors signed a tentative
deal with one of the prisoners, Amos Nahum, according to which Nahum and Dali
would both be pardoned if credible information was received and the body was
found.
“Both of the prisoners [Nahum and Dali] are in the final third of
their sentences.
Both are aware of the importance of this, and are very
interested in getting hold of the map,” Kenig said.
In addition to his
private arrangement with the two fellow prisoners, Moshe is also demanding
hundreds of thousands of shekels from the state, a request that is still being
negotiated.
Halabi set out from his home in Daliat al-Carmel to an IDF
base in Haifa in 2005.
His last known steps are ordinary: He withdrew
money at a local ATM and purchased a drink at a kiosk. After that, Halabi
disappeared.
Posters offering 10 million dollars in cash rewards are
hanging in Daliat al-Carmel pleading for information on the
soldier.
Nazmi Halabi, the missing son’s father, told Channel 10 he and
his family were undergoing a difficult period, and expressed hope that his son
was alive.
“It’s the same story every time,” he said. “These prisoners
talk each time, and I don’t believe in them. This has happened before in the
past... and it turned out to be untrue.”