The parents of Yoni Alzam, a prisoner serving a life sentence who was poisoned shortly before he was set to testify in an underworld murder trial in December 2005, intend to file suit against the Israel Prisons Service in the Tel Aviv Municipal Court on Sunday.

Alzam's body was found with no vital signs hours before he was scheduled to appear as a state witness in the trial of Shimon Zarihan, a suspect in the murder of underworld figure Hanina Ohana in 2003. Alzam himself had been convicted for the murder and was serving a life sentence.

An autopsy revealed that died of cyanide poisoning. In the wake of Alzam's death, the case against Zarihan was dropped.

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Alzam's parents are seeking more than NIS 10 million in damages in their lawsuit and maintain that officers in the Prisons Service failed in their duty to protect their son, especially in light of the fact that he was set to testify in a murder case against known underworld figures.

According to Alzam's parents, officers allowed two known criminals to visit their son on the day of his death. It is believed that one of the two men passed Alzam a cyanide pill that he then ingested.

Police believe Alzam swallowed the pill because he was told would it make him ill in order to delay his testimony before the court. The pill that he swallowed in fact contained a considerable amount of poison certain to kill him, without his prior knowledge.

Alzam's testimony was expected to be a deciding factor in the case against Zarihan, but a few hours before he was slated to testify, Alzam began to feel seriously ill and was rushed to a Netanya hospital, where he died a few hours later.

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