World

Israel: U.S. Suspect Can Stay

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

February 25, 1999 / 8:21 AM EST / CBS

Israel's Supreme Court Thursday blocked the extradition of an 18-year-old wanted on murder charges in Maryland, ordering him tried in Israel instead.

Samuel Sheinbein showed no reaction when Chief Justice Aharon Barak read the 3-2 decision. The ruling, which overturned a lower court order, could strain ties between Israel and the United States.

Sheinbein is accused of killing and dismembering a fellow teen-ager in a Washington, D.C., suburb in 1997, reports CBS News Correspondent Jesse Schulman. After the killing, Sheinbein, who is Jewish with an Israeli father, fled to Israel and claimed citizenship.

The law in Israel says a citizen of the Jewish State cannot be extradited against his will, no matter what the crime or where it was committed. Maryland prosecutors traveled to Israel to fight for his return.

Plea bargaining and legal wrangling dragged on for a year and a half, but Thursday the final ruling was hand down. The court declared Sheinbein's claim to Israeli citizenship valid and barred his extradition.

Sheinbein fled to Israel Sept. 21, 1997, two days after Alfred Tello Jr.'s mutilated and burned body was discovered in the garage of an empty Maryland home.

The Jerusalem District Court ruled last year that Sheinbein could be returned to the United States because he did not maintain close ties to Israel, but the Supreme Court said in its ruling Thursday that "no further affinity with Israel is required for the appellant to be considered an Israeli citizen."

Justice Ministry officials said he would be indicted in the next few days for trial in Israel on the same charges. In the meantime, he will remain in detention.

"What has to be remembered, and we will say it to the United States, is that justice will be done," said Irit Kahn, a senior Justice Ministry official who had argued in favor of extradition.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's advisers and the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv refused comment on the decision.

Sheinbein's father, Sol, has said he wanted his son tried in Israel because he feared for his safety in a U.S. prison.

Legislator Hanan Porat, chairman of parliament's Law Committee, welcomed the decision.

"We had evidence that showed a danger to his (Sheinbein's) life if he was deported," Porat said, referring to Sheinbein's alleged accomplice, Aaron Needle, who committed suicide in jail.

Porat's committee is considering a bill that would amend the law barring the extradition of Israeli citizens. The law was passed at the urging of then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin, who feared persecution against Jews in foreign courts.

At the time, the legislation was sharply criticized by legal experts who said it would harm Israel's relations with other countries.

"It simply gives Israel a bad name. And if Israel wants to be part of the enlightened democratic world, it has to accept the rules," said Amnon Rubinstein, lawyer and legislator of the opposition Meretz Party.