With regard to the location of the appellant in the appropriate punishment area, the trial court first noted that the appellant was born in 1960 and had no criminal record. Subsequently, the court rejected the appellant's arguments regarding the pressure in which she was subjected, on the grounds that this did not justify her actions and the violence she used against her. With regard to the recommendation of the Probation Service, the court ruled that it should not be accepted, since the rehabilitative proceeding in the appellant's case does not justify deviating from the penalty area on the one hand; Given that the considerations of punishment in this case require the imposition of an actual imprisonment to a significant extent than this. Against the background of the aforesaid, the court placed the appellant in the middle of the penalty range that it determined. Accordingly, the appellant was sentenced to the following penalties: 5 years imprisonment to be served in practice; 9 months of conditional imprisonment so that no offense of those convicted for three years from the date of her release shall pass; and payment of compensation in the total amount of NIS 180,000 (divided as follows: NIS 10,000 for each of the minors listed in section 3 of the indictment, with the exception of the minor also mentioned in Charge 15, whose compensation to his parents was set at NIS 20,000).
The appeal before us was filed against The Verdict, in relation to most of the offenses of which the appellant was convicted; and towards The Verdict, in relation to the actual imprisonment component only.
The appeal at hand and the proceeding before this court
- As stated, the appellant does not accept the verdict and the sentence, and therefore filed the appeal before us. According to her, she should be acquitted of most of the offenses of assault, and of the offenses of leaving a child unsupervised and of the offenses of abuse. In addition, according to the appellant, she should be sentenced to imprisonment by way of community service.
As for the judgment – the essence of the appellant's arguments in relation to the offenses of assault is that the trial court erred in classifying the acts attributed to her as criminal assault incidents – since "Not every grasp or grasp of a minor by a kindergarten teacher during work is an assault" (paragraph 7 of the appeal). At most, she argues, her actions are at the lowest level of assault offenses. The appellant also claimed that the videos clearly support her position. With regard to the offenses of leaving a child unsupervised, it was argued, inter alia, that the children were not left in a dangerous and isolated place, but were located inside the kindergarten compound; that the relevant aides were not charged at all in these incidents; and that in any case, the risk to which the children were exposed could have occurred even if they had been in the center of the kindergarten under supervision. Further, and with regard to the offenses of abuse, the appellant argues that the trial court erred in convicting her of two offenses of abuse of a minor, since this offense deals with much more serious cases. On the merits, with regard to Charge 15, it was argued that leaving a child in wet clothes urinating for a few minutes is not abuse; In relation to Charge 16, it was argued that her actions did not constitute assault, and it was certainly not possible to determine on the basis of them that the elements of the offense of abuse existed. It was further argued that the fact that the state reduced the period of time described in this indictment to two years, and then it was reduced by the court only to the relevant period, constitutes a complete acquittal of this charge.