Last update - 00:00 25/03/2008
Court extends remand for mother suspected of abusing her 12 children
By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent
A Jerusalem court on Tuesday extended by six days the remand of a Beit Shemesh woman suspected of abusing her twelve children.
Police believe that the children had sexual intercourse with each other, some for a long period of time.
"The investigation started a few months ago following a complaint from a distressed teen. I arrived at the house and it seemed as though something was not right there," said police head of investigations in Beit Shemesh, Roni Markovitch. "We opened with a wide-scale undercover investigation, and then we received complaints of violence within the family and incest between the siblings."
Markovitch maintained that not all of the 12 children were involved in incest.
During the police investigation, it became evident that the mother was violent towards some of her children, and would routinely beat them, sometimes with a sharp object. In other instances, when the children would come home late, they would be sent to sleep in a locked shed outside of the house.
"The mother called what happened there 'education,' and I call it terror," said Markovitch, "the violence in that house was not easy. I have investigated many cases, and this is the hardest."
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