The police officer who shot and killed Ethiopian Israeli Solomon Tekah in Haifa in June was indicted for negligent homicide on Tuesday in the Haifa Magistrate’s Court, Channel 12 News reported.

Negligent homicide carries a maximum punishment of three years in jail.

The accidental killing of Tekah led to violent protests by the Ethiopian community throughout Israel against alleged discrimination of the community by police.

On June 30, 2019, an off-duty police officer was walking with his wife and young children in Haifa when he spotted three Ethiopian men assaulting a 13-year-old boy in an attempt to steal his phone. The officer tried to break up the fight but the young men, who appeared to be drunk, began cursing at him, threatening him and throwing rocks at him, wounding him on his head, chest and shoulders.

The officer, fearing that his and his family members’ lives were in danger, shot a warning shot at the ground but the bullet ricocheted off the ground, striking Tekah and killing him. A police ballistics examination confirmed the officer’s version that the bullet which struck Tekah was fired at the ground. The police officer said that he didn’t shoot a warning shot in the air rather than the ground due to the fact that it was a populated area and he feared harming passersby.

Furthermore, the Police Investigations Department (PID) stated that an autopsy found that Tekah had a very high alcohol level in his blood at the time he was shot as well as residual drugs, a Maariv report said.

The Ethiopian community, aided by left-wing activists, began a series of violent protests across Israel in the wake of Tekah’s death with little regard to the facts of the case. Pictures of the police officer and his small children, ages 7 months, 5, and 7, were posted on social media with calls to murder them. The officer and his family were forced to be moved from their home for their safety to an undisclosed location and were placed under police protection for the highest threat level which exists in Israel.

“The decision was made following a thorough examination of the circumstances of the incident, including the fact that the police officer’s firing [of his gun] was not in accordance with police directives, which are well known to him, and he didn’t implement more proportionate alternatives available to him,” the Ministry of Justice stated. “The decision took into account the fact that the policeman was attacked with stones by the deceased and other men and was even wounded in the incident before using his gun. But in the totality of circumstances, it was found that there were grounds to prosecute him.”

The indictment stated that the police officer: should have settled with firing a warning shot in the air; that police guidelines don’t allow firing at the ground under those particular circumstances; that he fired at asphalt, a hard and flat surface which shouldn’t be fired at due to risk of ricochets; and that he didn’t fire at the nearby sandy ground which would have decreased the chance of ricochets.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)