On October 19, 1994, following a bus attack in Dizengoff Street in Tel-Aviv, a general closure was imposed on the West Bank. Roni Borgana, who was a border police career officer, then serving as a security officer of Moshav Beit Hashmonay in Israel, took it upon himself to expel three Palestinian laborers who worked in Moshav Azaria in Israel, although Azaria lay outside his jurisdiction. Note, despite the closure, the police officer in charge of Azaria security permitted the laborers, who had permits for work and overnight stay, to remain in Azaria.
That night, Borgana and two subordinates arrived at the laborers' sleeping-quarters, woke them up by beating and kicking them, and embarked on an ordeal of abuse, which included blows all over their bodies and extreme physical violence. Among other things, Borgana beat them with a club and other blunt instruments, stabbed them with a sedative syringe and forced them to sing chants praising the border police, such as "give me hummus, give me ful, the border police is really cool". When one of the laborers asked Borgana why he was beating them, he replied: "you son of a bitch, you dare talk after you killed 30 people". At the ordeal's end, the three were taken in the patrol car, dropped near the Green Line, and ordered to get back to their village in the West Bank.
In December 1999,
the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court convicted Borgana of assault causing bodily harm. Borgana was also convicted of soliciting perjury during investigation, urging his accomplices to give a false version of where the detention took place in their interrogation. In January 2001, Borgana was given a ten months' suspended sentence, 300 hours of community service and a 5,000 NIS fine.
HaMoked represented the three victims
in a civil claim which followed the criminal conviction, filed in March 2001. The plaintiffs contended that Borgana had caused them mental and physical injury.
The judgment, issued in October 2002, compelled Borgana to pay each plaintiff the sum of 12,000 NIS, and 3,000 NIS in legal expenses.
Borgana evaded payment for years. HaMoked appealed to the execution office, which, inter alia issued an arrest warrant against Borgana, a stay of exit order, and an order restricting passport renewal. Ultimately, efforts yielded results, and on January 9, 2011, 16 years after the three had been attacked by Borgana, his family liquidated his debt and paid the plaintiffs around 40,000 NIS in total.
