Ex-hi-tech man who sexually abused minors gets 14 years

Defendant, former deputy head of a hi-tech company, sentenced to 14 years in prison and 10,000 shekel fine to be paid to each one of the victims.

By BEN HARTMAN
Arrest [illustrative] 370 (photo credit: Nir Elias/Reuters)
Arrest [illustrative] 370
(photo credit: Nir Elias/Reuters)
The Central District Court on Wednesday sentenced a 42-year-old man to 14 years in prison for sex crimes against 29 male and female minors he met on the Internet.
The defendant, the former deputy head of a hi-tech company, was convicted in a plea bargain, and was ordered to pay NIS 10,000 to each of his victims.
He used a number of aliases, posing as a teenage girl to manipulate teenagers he met online, and convinced them to perform sex acts on themselves in front of a webcam while he watched. He convinced a 13-year-old boy to perform sex acts on his 11-year-old sister, according to the indictment.
The charges he faced included sexual assault of a minor, sexual harassment of a minor and extortion.
In the verdict, judges wrote that “the suspect worked in a systematic manner, and after minors fell into his web he began to converse with him while using explicit sexual language. The suspect had a talent for convincing people and was a talented manipulator and the minors were exposed to horrible acts that they carried out by his instruction.”
The sentence was stiff, and the court issued it to establish deterrence, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors called it “one of the more serious indictments that have been presented for sex crimes using the Internet.”
The Internet “is a dangerous environment that is only getting worse for minors. The plea bargain reached in the case leaves the severe crimes in the indictment which the defendant admitted to the crimes,” they said.