Barnoar shooting: 2.2 million shekels to accused murderer's family
The Felicians will be compensated with NIS 2.2 million for being wrongfully accused and harrassed by the police after Hagai Felician was accused of being responsible for opening fire at the Barnoar gay youth center.
A mediation agreement was reached between the prosecution and the Felician family, whose two sons were accused of being involved and orchestrating the terrorist attack at the Barnoar gay youth center in 2009, stipulating that the family will be compensated with 2.2 million shekels, due to the botched police investigation.
The Felician family initially asked for more than 18 million shekels, claiming negligence by the state. Though the state attorney did not admit to negligence, it did recognize the damage inflicted upon the family due to the police investigation.
The compensation will include payment to Hagai Felician, who was accused of being the masked person who opened fire at the Barnoar, killing two and wounding several of the people present at the youth club. The indictment against his brother, Benny, has also been dropped.
Though a great deal of time, effort and funding went into the Barnoar investigation, the police's conduct throughout it has been criticized for its many mishaps. Among them was keeping Hagai Felician in jail for eight months, reportedly waiting for him to break down and confess.
Initially, the police based their investigation and their assumption of Felician's guilt on the testimony of Zaor Hankishayev. After the police had already declared to have solved the case, though, it was discovered that Hankishayev's testimony was false. This eventually brought about an indictment against Hankishayev, who confessed and was sentenced to five years in prison.
Throughout the investigation and his time in jail, Felician continued to maintain his innocence. Rivka Felician, Hagai and Benny's mother, responded to the agreement after it was made public: "This isn't appropriate compensation for the damage they caused us. We expected it to be higher,it's a joke. Our family went and is still going through very hard things."
