Since the goods, which are the subject of this indictment, were sent by way of air transport, there was no need to use the original bill of lading, and it was possible to use a copy of the bill of lading, which bears the bank's stamp of lading. These words were not in dispute, and as was made clear with regard to the previous charge, the goods, which are the subject of the third charge, were released by mistake, since it was a matter of sea transport, and the original bill of lading was required to be presented.
In this case, a forged stamp of the Arab Bank was stamped on a copy of the bill of lading, and in this way the goods could be released, through customs brokers.
There is no dispute that the bill of lading was attached to a document, pretending to be a sales account dated July 13, 2000, by the Trust Exports Pte Ltd, which is supposed to be the supplier of goods. While in the original sales account the cost of the goods is $181,870, in the false sale account, the cost is only $32,995.
As stated, the goods were released by means of a bill of lading bearing a forged stamp, while a false sales account was attached to the import registry drawn up by the customs broker, Noah Niv, in which the cost of the goods is drastically reduced. In this way, the goods were fraudulently removed from the freight forwarder's authority, and import taxes were paid, to a much lesser extent, than the amount that would have been paid had the real supplier's account been presented.
The obvious question is, was the prosecution able to prove the involvement of defendants 1, 3 and 4 in the commission of the offenses attributed to them, in the framework of this indictment?
The prosecution claims that the person who executed the invitation that is the subject of the fourth indictment, and the rest of the orders in this group of charges, is none other than defendant 3, who, according to him, did so at the request of defendant 1.
Defendant 3, in his testimony in court, retracted the statements he made in his statements to the police, which indicate that he was a mediator between a company in Ramallah, the ICC. Jerusalem, and suppliers from Europe, with the contacts on behalf of the ICC There were people who answered the names Amjad and Jamal. According to him, in a statement dated 20 September 2000 (P/329), he met with Jamal and Amjad at the American Colony Hotel in East Jerusalem, and he even gave a description of the two. In the same statement, defendant 3 stated that he knew Uri Resh, who was engaged in preparing letters of credit for imports, and that he still owed him money for loans he received from him. According to his version, Uri Resh is not connected to the deals made with the company ICC From Ramallah.