Criminal Case (Tel Aviv) 35106-11-21 State of Israel v. Neta Cuneo

1. General background and definition of the dispute between the parties:
2. The defendant was charged before me, in the indictment, with committing multiple offenses of fraud and breach of trust, under the provisions of section 284 of the Penal Law, 5737-1977 (hereinafter: the Penal Law), as well as offenses of obstruction of justice, in accordance with the provisions of section 244 of the Law. penalties, and the offense of confidentiality (disclosure of information in breach of confidentiality), in accordance with the provisions of section 16 of the Protection of Privacy Law, 5741-1981 (hereinafter: the Protection of Privacy Law).
3. During the period relevant to the indictment, the defendant served as a police officer, in the role of registrar, in the Tel Aviv District Traffic Division of the Israel Police (ATAN Tel Aviv). This was after the defendant served for many years in the police in previous positions, first on patrol in Haifa and then as an investigator at the Jaffa station.  By virtue of her role as the registrar of a civil case at ATAN, the defendant had access to certain police databases, as will be detailed below.
4. The events of the indictment revolve around the accuser's claims that on many occasions the defendant illegally passed on police information, mainly (but not exclusively) against the background of a relationship that was forged between her and Yosef (Yossi) Haim Shmuel, a young man involved in criminal activities, whom the defendant knew on March 11, 2021.
5. It should be noted, against the background, that at the same time, two main police investigations relevant to the case of Yossi and his accomplices, including his friend Tal Mizrahi, were conducted in two different districts of the Israel Police:

 The first is an undercover investigation at the outset, on suspicion of offenses of trafficking in weapons (weapons) in the Jerusalem District (hereinafter - the YLP Kedem investigation).

The second is an investigation into suspected outbursts in the Ayalon area of the Tel Aviv district.

5. Yossi and Tal were arrested as part of the investigation of YLP Kedem, together with other accomplices, on 01 August 2021. Following this investigation, an indictment was filed in the Jerusalem District Court against three defendants - Yossi, Tal Mizrahi andOmri Weil - in which all three were charged with committing numerous weapons offenses and related offenses.

• The main points of the indictment:

6. The indictment filed against the defendant holds five charges. In the first charge, the table lists 38 cases in which the defendant reviewed the information contained in police information systems - the "PLA system" (traffic) and the "human system".  This information relates to a large part of Yossi, but also to others related to Yossi, including Tal Mizrahi, Omri Weil, andNachman Apte, as well as other people.  All this, between 04.04.21 and 14.07.21.
7. The Ottoman Settlement [Old Version] 1916According to the facts of the first indictment, after the information was produced, the defendant transferred information to Yossi, in some cases by taking a screenshot of the police computer and transmitting the footage via text messages. Thus, as an example from the above table, on April 4, 2021, the defendant conducted a demographic information check in Yossi's case, and provided him with a photocopy of the list of investigation files in his case.  Thus, as another example, on July 1, 2021, the defendant sent Yossi a text message with a photocopy of a list of investigation files, as well as a photocopy of a poster in which he appears as a "declared spokesman", as well as a text message with a photocopy of the list of investigation files of Tal Mizrahi.  In addition, the table describes the transfers of a list of investigation files and a declaration of detention toYakir Maimoni, as well as a photograph of a license suspension and a printout of criminal information to Assaf Ben Shmuel.
8. 12-34-56-78 Chekhov v. State of Israel, P.D.  51 (2)It was also claimed, in the facts of the first indictment, that the investigation of YLP Kedem was conducted in secret at the outset, and therefore the investigation files were classified as confidential after they were opened.  As part of the investigation of YLP Kedem, a new PLA file was opened, among other things, on June 29, 2021, against Yossi and his accomplices.  However, before the investigators had time to classify it as confidential, on July 1, 2021, the defendant entered the system and examined the new file that had been opened.  The defendant photographed the list of Yossi and Tal Mizrahi's investigation files, and as stated in the table, she transferred the photographs to Yossi and thus informed him of the existence of the new file.  The defendant was therefore charged, in the first charge, with multiple offenses of fraud and breach of trust, and with the offense of obstruction of justice.
9. The second charge (hereinafter referred to as the incident of Yossi's interrogation in the assault case) concerns another investigation file, on suspicion of an assault offense, which was opened against Yossi on March 11, 2021. On April 5, 2021, Yossi was served with a summons for interrogation in this case, which was supposed to take place the next day, without being informed of the suspicion and its nature.  On the same day (05 April 2021) at approximately 9:48 P.M., while she was at home with Yossi, the defendant contacted Policewoman Lynn Tarno and inquired with her who the investigators on duty were, in order to obtain information about the investigation.  The defendant then contacted the investigator on duty and then the on-duty investigator Sivan Sabag and asked her, without mentioning her connection to Yossi, to conduct an examination of the case.
10. According to the facts of the second indictment, Sivan believed that the information was required by the defendant for the purpose of fulfilling her police duties, and therefore she conducted the requested examination and provided the information to the defendant. The defendant gave the information to Yossi, who was with her at her home all the time, including information regarding the suspicion attributed to him and its nature, and everything is transferred to his interrogation in this matter, which was conducted the next day (on April 6, 2021).  The defendant was therefore charged, on a second charge, with offenses of fraud, breach of trust, and obstruction of justice.
11. The third charge (hereinafter referred to as the accident incident) concerns the defendant's actions against the background of a road accident that occurred on May 13, 2021 in Holon, in which Yossi and Tal Mizrahi were involved, for which a road accident investigation file was opened. By virtue of her position, the defendant had access to this investigation file and she took advantage of this and passed on information about the investigation to Yossi.
12. On May 23, 2021, the defendant entered the system and reviewed the investigation file, photocopied the investigation log and forwarded the photograph to Yossi via text message. On May 24, 2021, the defendant entered the system again, took a photo of the action report written by the patrol officer, and forwarded the photograph to Yossi via text message.  On May 31, 2021, the defendant re-entered the system, took a photo of the message that was taken from Tal and forwarded the photograph to Yossi via text message.  In this indictment as well, the defendant was charged with fraud, breach of trust, and obstruction of justice.
13. Copied from NevoAccording to what is alleged in the facts of the fourth indictment (hereinafter referred to as the Arms License Incident) on June 15, 2021, the defendant reviewed, as part of her duties, an investigation file regarding a road accident in respect of which a complaint had been filed the day before. As part of the examination, the defendant noticed that a certain person named Yehezkel, the father of the complainant in this traffic case, had a firearms license.  The defendant photographed Yehezkel's list of weapons licenses, as well as the means of communication and demographic information about him, and forwarded the photographs to Yossi via text message.  In this indictment, the defendant was charged with offenses of fraud and breach of trust and confidentiality (disclosure of information while breaching confidentiality).
14. The fifth charge (hereinafter referred to as the report incident) concerned a traffic incident in which Yossi was involved on April 1, 2021. On the same day, at approximately 01:20, Yossi was detained on suspicion of reckless driving, in the area of the Wolfson interchange.  Immediately after he was detained, by a police volunteer who informed him that he intended to file a report, Yossi called the defendant and asked for her help.  The defendant asked Yossi to tell the volunteer that she was a policewoman and to give him the phone, and then she spoke to the volunteer and asked him to give up the report.
15. The volunteer explained to the defendant that he was not qualified to do so and referred her to the policeman in charge of him, Sgt. Adir Kadosh.  The defendant called Sergeant Kadosh and asked him to instruct the volunteer to forgo registering the report to Yossi.  When Sgt.  Kadosh refused to do so and told the defendant that he was on his way to the scene of the incident, the defendant sent him a text message in which she repeated her request - that the volunteers release Yossi - and called him again.  In this indictment, the defendant was charged with the offense of fraud and breach of trust.

• The preliminary proceedings and the defendant's response to the indictment:

16. The preliminary proceedings were conducted before a previous panel. Immediately at the beginning of the proceedings, the defendant's counsel announced that his client had filed a complaint against her interrogators in the Department for the Investigation of Police (DIP), which had been transferred to the Inspector General for Treatment, and claimed that its results should be awaited.  The defendant's counsel raised very strong arguments against the interrogation of prosecutors by virtue of various laws in the defendant's case.  Among other things, the defense argued that lawsuits by virtue of various laws had turned the defendant's interrogation, during her detention, into a media sensation, while trampling on the defendant's dignity and baseless publications about her, according to which she was supposedly a member of a gang that dealt in arms.  All this, despite the fact that the defense claims that the basis of the investigation lies in the difficult and bitter marital dispute between the defendant and her ex-husband, Eran (hereinafter also - the divorcee), who at the time was a police officer with the rank of superintendent (and he himself was interrogated by prosecutors under various laws in another matter, and an indictment was filed against him in which the defendant was registered as a prosecution witness).
17. However, according to the accuser's statement in the continuation of the preliminary proceedings, the defendant's complaint to the Inspector was rejected by the Deputy State Attorney for Criminal Affairs (see Request No. 4 and Appendix thereto).  However, later on, the defendant filed another complaint with the Ombudsman about the state's representatives in the courts (see application no.  9) and repeatedly raised similar claims throughout the trial, including in the framework of the witnesses' interrogations.  In any event, after the said announcement, the defendant's response to the charges was delivered by the defense attorney before the panel that heard the preliminary proceedings.
18. The response to the indictment was divided into two heads, with the first head raising "petty allegations regarding the admissibility of the messages she gave (the defendant - S.a) in DIP investigations" (in the transcript, p. 3, line 15), due to the alleged use of improper interrogation methods and the consequent need to conduct a minor trial.  In contrast, the second head of the answer included a reference to the facts of the indictment, which, as a rule, was a general heresy.  However, in the context of the first charge, the defense attorney added that the defendant's claim "is that this is her job, she did her job.  If it were not for a spouse in a short period of time, if every person involved in a car accident asked for information, he would have received it.  This is her role and the service she has done"^[1] (ibid., p.  4, line 20 ff.).  With regard to the fifth charge (the incident of the report), the defense attorney further argued that the ex-wife "is creating this whole storm" (ibid., p.  5, line 12).
19. The case was transferred before me for the hearing of the evidence and also for the purpose of hearing the petty claims. After hearing the arguments of counsel for the parties on this matter, including the written arguments, I rejected the defense's petition to hold a summary trial.  This is determined by, inter alia, as follows:

...  As is well known, a minor trial is intended for cases in which a defendant claims that he confessed to committing an offense due to improper means used against him.  Hence, a prerequisite for the existence of a mini-trial is an admission of guilt to an offense, which the defendant currently denies.  The problem is that the defendant before me did not confess in her interrogations to committing an offense.  The defendant confirmed that although she had reviewed the information or passed on information, she claimed - just as she claimed in her response to the indictment - that she had done so under legitimate circumstances.