Last update - 00:00 15/02/2007
Parents of slain Katzrin girl appeal to be shown material used in case
By Eli Ashkenazi, Haaretz Correspondent
The parents of Tair Rada, the 12-year-old girl murdered two months ago in the Golan Heights town of Katzrin, filed an appeal Thursday to the High Court to demand that they be shown the materials used in the investigation of their daughter's murder.
"It is unacceptable that the family of the deceased should be left in the dark, without knowing how the subject of their grief is being handled by the law," said the appeal, drafted by attorneys Moshe and Shira Maroz after the State Prosecutor rejected the family's request for the materials.
Last week Silvia Freiman, the Northern District Prosecutor, notified the two attorneys that "following negotiations at the State Prosecutor's Office on the matter, the office came to the conclusion that there is no cause for providing the materials of the investigation to the family for review."
Freiman added that she invited the family for a meeting, in which testimony from the case would be presented before them and they would be given the opportunity to ask questions about it.
The attorneys based their appeal on the law protecting crime victims, which they say offers victims and their families the option to be take part in the legal process.
"We are talking about an usual case in which the daughter of the appellants was brutally murdered without a motive, and many answers remain unanswered even after the man accused of the crime was apprehended. DNA results were recently released, and raise doubts on the involvement of the accused in the murder," the appeal said.
"The peace of mind the family is asking for is the least that can be offered it under the circumstances," it said.
The appeal also cites a request by the family's attorneys to examine the legal options for investigating whether negligence occurred on any level to allow the murder to occur.