U.S.-born wife-abuser convicted on appeal

The Jerusalem District Court last month overturned the ruling by a lower court that punished an American immigrant from Beit Shemesh for assaulting his wife without actually convicting him, Anglo File has learned.

Shlomo Dikman, who moved to Israel seven years ago from the U.S. with his spouse, assaulted his wife of 36 years in 2007, when she was trying to leave their home after he hurled objects at her, according to court documents. He dragged her back inside on the floor and placed his foot on her stomach, injurying her in the head. One year later, he shoved his wife during an argument, the documents reveal.

The Beit Shemesh magistrate's court in 2008 found it sufficient to pronounce Dikman guilty without formally convicting him - sentencing him to 150 hours of community service and a one-year probation period without giving him a criminal record. The national probation service recommended against conviction out of "concern for Shlomo Dikman's future employment situation and in light of his willingness to participate in therapy suitable to his religious life," according to the District Court noted. Dikman, 57, works in computer online support.

The Jerusalem Prosecutor's Office then appealed to the higher court, which convicted Dikman, but did not add to his sentence. District Judges Hana Ben-Ami, Tamar Bazak-Rappaport and David Mintz wrote that the lower court also chose not to convict Dikman based on his wife's description of him as a "positive and caring person" who became violent in isolated incidents as a result of "frustration and disappointment over her performance as a housewife."

The Jerusalem judges, however, found Dikman's behavior to be "especially grave" in light of what the wife said about the couple's long relationship. He therefore should be convicted, the judges wrote in their scathing five-page ruling to overturn the magistrate decision.

As for his wife's positive statements about him, the court's ruling said Dikman had a "problematic behavior pattern" vis-a-vis his wife and that "an ambivalent relationship of love and fear is common among women who suffered violence from their spouses."