Head of police major crimes unit briefly arrested after refusing to sign off on release conditions following interrogation

Investigators briefly arrested, and then released, the chief of Israel Police Lahav 433 major crimes unit after he initially refused to sign off on conditions for his release following a lengthy interrogation, his defense attorney says.

Deputy Commissioner Manny Binyamin was questioned for eight hours by investigators in the Department for Internal Police Investigations today, marking the third time he has been interrogated as part of an ongoing criminal probe into suspicions he committed several corruption-related offenses.

Binyamin’s lawyer, Uri Korb, alleges that his client was strong-armed into signing off on release conditions and even assaulted by a DIPI investigator at the end of his interrogation, as he consulted with his attorney over the phone.

Korb says the sudden demand that he sign off on release conditions was illicit and unwarranted, given the fact that he had been free, subject to no limitations, for 10 days. Binyamin nevertheless signed off on the conditions with the exception of one — a prohibition on him “meeting with a subordinate officer who works with him in the same building.”

Investigators at that moment chose to place Binyamin under arrest, which Korb alleges amounts to abuse of authority and breach of trust — the same offenses that Binyamin is suspected of. Under threat of arrest, Binyamin conceded and signed off on the conditions, the lawyer says.

The attorney tells Ynet that Binyamin will nevertheless show up to work tomorrow at his unit’s offices in Lod, after the officer’s return to his post was granted by police chief Danny Levy last week Thursday.

“It appears that in its conduct in this case, the DIPI has crossed all boundaries,” Korb says, urging “immediate intervention by external authorities” to set limits on the agency, subordinate to the State Attorney’s Office.