A 47-year-old Ashkelon resident is facing a criminal indictment as she is suspected of stealing NIS 623,100 from an 83-year-old blind Holocaust ‘survivor’ who relied on her to care for him and attend to paying his bills and other financial matters. The criminal indictment was filed in the Be’er Sheva Magistrate’s Court on Sunday, December 29, 2019.

According to the indictment, filed by prosecutor Giora Hazan, during a three-year period between 2016-2019, the defendant was employed by the victim and her duties included assisting him in caring for financial matters, which gave her access to credit cards, as well as PIN numbers; as the victim is blind and she also shopped and went to the ATM.

She did not wait too long before beginning to use his credit card without his knowledge and permission, spending NIS 200,000 in clothing stores, different supermarkets, pet stores and more, all at his expense. She also used an ATM to get cash whenever she felt the need. She continued until using over NIS 600,000 of his money. As part of this, she stole his checkbooks, forged checks, and used his checks in various stores.

The indictment also states that the defendant, who felt her actions may be revealed, tried to balance the Holocaust survivor’s accounts. She made cash deposits from various sources, as well as transferring money between the accounts. part of this, she stole his checkbooks, forged checks, and used his checks in various stores.

Thirteen checks were taken to ‘changing’ stores, from which she received NIS 73,100 in cash to juggle his credit card bills before being revealed.

Her actions were revealed in November of this year by a son of the victim.

The prosecution asked the court to order the defendant held without bail.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)