The Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court on Sunday extended for three additional days
the remand of 23-year-old Yaniv Feirovskine, who is suspected of having
hit two
women runners with his all-terrain vehicle before fleeing the scene some two
weeks ago near Kibbutz Givat Brenner.
The court issued its ruling largely
on the basis of a confession and reenactment of the incident. Police said the
confession had been obtained without any irregularities, although the suspect’s
lawyer claimed it had been obtained under duress and through improper
promises.
Feirovskine, of Moshav Ganei Yohanan near Rehovot, was arrested
a week-and-a-half ago and could face charges of abandonment after causing grave
bodily harm if indicted. He originally denied having hit the
runners.
Feirovskine’s attorney claimed that police had said they would
guarantee his client a sentence of 250 hours of community service at worst and
that he could be home for Rosh Hashana if he confessed. The police insisted that
all they had promised was that telling the truth would clear his
conscience.
One reason for the discrepancy is that while almost all
police interaction with Feirovskine was taped, one pre-interrogation
conversation was not. This is not uncommon, and defense attorneys often seek to
latch onto potential holes in a case and argue that they indicate a coverup
regarding what was said to the suspect.
Feirovskine’s lawyers can try to
cast doubts on his confession if the case goes to trial, but the judge at this
stage did not accept his claim that he had been coerced or lied to.
The
alleged hit-and-run incident took place while 15 runners trained on a dirt path
next to Givat Brenner’s fields. Two of them, including Olympic hopeful Radat
Baltah, were injured.
Some of the runners said the ATV driver had sped by
them, kicking up a large cloud of dust.
They said that after they
signaled him to slow down he turned around and drove back, intentionally
slamming into the two runners before driving off. A manhunt was launched shortly
afterwards.
According to Israeli media reports, Feirovskine said Saturday
that he did indeed turn back toward the runners but had not intended on striking
them with his vehicle.
Ben Hartman and Jerusalem Post staff contributed
to this report.