Driver who hit protesters in 2024 gets year in prison for reckless endangerment

The Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday sentenced Haim Sirotkin, a soccer coach who was convicted of ramming his car into a crowd of anti-government protesters in 2024, to a year in prison for reckless endangerment with a vehicle.

Sirotkin, 52, will also have his license suspended for four years.

In addition, he will have to pay damages of NIS 20,000 ($6,800) to one of the people injured – a woman of around 60, who suffered a head injury and four broken ribs – and NIS 4,000 ($1,360) each to four others.

The five protesters were making their way from a protest that night – April 7, 2024 – against the government and in favor of a hostage deal with the Hamas terror group, which at the time held some 130 captives, living and deceased.

After the incident, Sirotkin claimed he did not mean to hurt anyone, and that he had lost control of his vehicle as a result of a malfunction.

In his sentencing decision, Judge Itai Hermelin noted that the accused did not maintain this claim during the trial.

תיעוד דריסת המפגינים בתל אביב. 5 נפגעו. הנהג נעצר לאחר שברח מהמקום

צילום: איתי רזיאל pic.twitter.com/t8Lc54tbfZ

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— Bar Peleg (@bar_peleg) April 6, 2024

Hermelin also noted that the government did not accuse the former soccer player of driving with the specific intention of hurting the protesters, but rather of acting recklessly, with indifference to the results of his actions.

However, the judge wrote, “It’s impossible to completely detach the accused’s impatience, which caused him to step on the accelerator… from the confrontation that developed between the passengers in the vehicle and the protesters.”

In video of the incident, people in the back seat of the vehicle, including Sirotkin’s wife, can be seen leaning out the window, arguing with protesters loudly and with profane language.

Furthermore, the judge argued, “the harm to protesters creates a harm to freedom of political expression, insofar as it clearly arouses fear of participating in any demonstration lest one get hurt.”

According to Hermelin, the choice was between sentencing Sirotkin to one or two years in prison. In explaining his decision to limit the sentence to one year, the judge noted that Sirotkin had expressed remorse, that he suffered financial harm as a result of the incident, and that he leads an otherwise upstanding life.