The State Prosecutor's Office filed an indictment in the Tel Aviv District Court Tuesday against two men suspected of being sent by a New York based Israeli crime ring to carry out revenge killings in Tel Aviv.

The two, Sergei Teplitzky and Iliya Khodonov, both former combat soldiers, had no criminal records and had worked as bodyguards for ministers and Knesset members. They were indicted for two charges of attempted murder, which they had made under the orders of Eitan Haya, 55, of Ramat Gan.

Police and the State Prosecutor's Office claim the background to the alleged murder attempts are the actions of an Israeli crime ring in New York in the 1980s, of which Haya was a leader.

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According to the indictment, Haya hired the services of Teplitzky and Khodonov through a middleman called Avi Stoar.

Teplitzky was charged with shooting Rishon Letzion resident Yoav Sina in February, whom Teplitzky believed to be an enemy of Haya's. Sina was badly injured and left paralyzed in one leg. Because he only wounded the man, Stoar gave Teplitzky the sum of 7,500$ instead of 15,000$, which he had been promised for the kill. But in any event Teplitzky shot the wrong man, who just happened to have the same name as his target.

According to the second charge, about a month and a half after this incident Stoar hired Teplitzky to kill one Itzik Cohen for 30,000$. Police believe this was because the latter had an affair with Haya's girlfriend some ten years ago, when Haya was imprisoned in the U.S.

Teplitzky asked his friend Khodonov to join him in this mission for half of the fee. Stoar gave them pistols and a silencer, but the actual murder was prevented after neighbours reported to police suspicious movement in the area around Cohen's house. Police at the scene arrested the pair after seeing them throw away a bag with the pistols in.