2 cops indicted for sexually harassing female complainants

The Police Internal Investigation Unit charged two officers on Monday with indecent assault and sexual harassment.

The two, from Ashdod, are accused of making lewd comments about a woman who came to the station to make a complaint, telling her to strip, taking photos and a video of her, and going through private photos on her phone. In a separate incident, one of the officers was recorded making sexual comments to a married woman who came to the station with her child.

The two were indicted in the Beersheba Magistrate’s Court on charges of indecent assault, sexual harassment, and breach of trust.

One of the women came to the station last September to file a complaint of telephone harassment. She spoke with officers Henri Benisti and Gerard Shitrit in Benisti’s office. According to the woman, the officers did not write down the details of her complaint but advised her to change her phone number. Benisti then allegedly took her phone and went through her images and videos, including some in which she wasn’t fully clothed, showing some of them to Shitrit.

Afterward, according to the indictment, the two officers told her to strip, which she did, and engaged in lewd discussions with her about her body, her sexual preferences and her relations with her husband. Benisti took several indecent photos and a video of the woman, and later sent them to Shitrit via the WhatsApp messaging app.

Three days later, another woman came to the Shitrit’s office with her husband and two children to file a complaint about a traffic accident. The officer told her to return a few days later to the station with certain forms that she did not have with her. When she returned with one of her children, according to the indictment, Shitrit closed the door and began telling her how sexy and attractive she was. She replied that she was married with children, to which Shitrit allegedly said, “A husband is not a wall.”

The woman filed a complaint with the Justice Ministry’s Police Internal Investigations Department. The next day she returned and recorded Shitrit as he repeated his earlier comments about her beauty. He told her that he had been unable to sleep because he was thinking about her all night. He told her that he dreamed “that I received a warm, real hug and a kiss from you. I am dying for your body, for everything,” he continued.

The prosecutor charged that “Gerard Shitrit sexually harassed the complainant with his repeated sexual comments toward her. This is an abuse of authority, taking advantage of his position of authority and the dependence of the complainant on him as a public servant.”