‘Murder suspect was subject of 2010 complaint’

Kiryat Yam resident allegedly killed three people, including girlfriend and her son, before turning gun on himself.

By BEN HARTMAN
Handcuffs arrest police crime illustrative 390 (photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
Handcuffs arrest police crime illustrative 390
(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
Kiryat Yam residents issued a police complaint in 2010 against a local man suspected of killing three people on Monday night before taking his own life.
The police complaint, published by “Krayot.com” on Tuesday, says that Dov Tagar was a violent, unstable man who threatened his neighbors and “anyone who criticized him,” according to the report. The report also includes a complaint sent by the municipality to police, after the complaint did not result in a police investigation, the report stated.
Police said Monday that Tagar had no criminal record.
Coastal District Police suspect that Tagar, 46, killed three people, including his girlfriend and her 17-year-old son, before killing himself with a single gunshot wound to the head as police closed in Monday night.
Police believe the first victim was Tagar’s friend, a hairstylist named Dov Yosef, 52, who was found shot to death in an elevator in a commercial building in Kiryat Haim. Police believe that Tagar shot Yosef and then fled in Yosef’s car, before he was cornered in a parking lot by police.
After Tagar was found dead, police found the bodies of Tagar’s girlfriend, Hatuela Kozniev, and her teenage son, Alex, stabbed to death in their Kiryat Shmuel apartment.
Police suspect that Tagar left the apartment and then made his way to Kiryat Haim, where he murdered Yosef.
Tagar was a security guard who used the pistol given to him by his job to kill Yosef. It is unclear why the police complaint or the complaint issued by the municipality did not prevent him from being licensed to carry a firearm for work.
The killing spree is currently being investigated as a crime driven by rage or jealousy on the part of Tagar.