User:BuffaloSpirit/Sandbox Murder of Derek Roth

The Murder of Derek Roth happened in Israel on January 9, 1994. Derek Roth, a taxi driver, was violently murdered by two 14-year-old boys, Moshe Ben-Ivgi (Hebrew: משה בן איבגי) and Arbel Aloni (Hebrew: ארבל אלוני). The crime was considered shocking due to its violence and the offenders' young age.

The Murder
On the night of January 9, 1994, Moshe Ben-Aivgi and Arbel Aloni, two 14-year-old boys from Herzliya, on a cab in Herzliya Pituah (Hebrew: הרצליה פיתוח), an affluent beachfront neighborhood in the western part of the city. The driver, Derek Roth, who worked in the taxi station in the neighborhood, picked them up. At 8:30 PM, the two teenagers shot the driver in the back six times, using a revolver. Five of the six bullets hit Roth in the back of the head, killing him instantly. At first, the police assumed the murder was a terrorist attack, but the violence of the crime and the absence of evidence indicating theft lead investigators to believe the murder was a terrorist attack.

The following day, the two bragged to their classmates about the murder. The Tel Aviv District police recieved the infromation later the same day, and the pair were arrested that evening. A stolen revolver was found in one of their homes. Ben-Aivgi and Aloni, both from "good homes", were described by the police as having criminal record, and did not express any remorse upon their arrest.

Rafi Peled, at the time the national chief of the Israeli Police, declared it to be "worse than a terrorist attack." Due to Israel's laws regarding offending minors, their names were not made public at the time of the murder. In October 1994, the two were found to be guilty of the crime and sentenced to 16 years in prison. In the verdict, the judges noted it was "Evil for the sake of evil. It was not theft but shooting for the sake of shooting."

It is unknown who pulled the trigger and what motivated two 14-year-old boys to commit such crimes.

The Murderers, After Being Sent to Prison
In February 1998, during a short furlough, Ben-Aivgi and Aloni robbed a convenience store in Herzliya and stabbed the cashier's hand in the process. They were sentenced to 5 additional years.

In 2000, the Supreme Court of Israel permitted the publication of their names. In May 2004, instead of returning from a furlough, Ben-Aivgi fled the country.

Meanwhile, Aloni, who got married while continuing to serve his sentence in Israel, requested to have his sentence commuted on two separate occasions - in July 2008 his request was denied by the Petah Tikva District Court, and in 2012 his request was denied again by the Parole Board. Aloni was released in 2015 after serving his 21-year sentence. In May 2019, Aloni was arrested again for fraud and tax-related offenses and convicted on October 27, 2020. He was sentenced to a 28-month sentence in prison, which he is currently serving.

Moshe Ben-Aivgi's escape and extradition
During a furlough in May 2004, Ben-Aivgi escaped from Israel to Argentina through Spain and Uruguay, while using a fake passport. He settled in Buenos Aires, where he was involved with other individuals with criminal backgrounds. On October 15, 2004, Ben-Aivgi was arrested in a suburb of Buenos Aires on drug-related charges. Israel and Argentina do not have an extradition agreement, leading the former's Ministry of Justice to make a special extradition request. On February 6, 2007, the Supreme Court of Argentina rejected the Israeli request and had him released. After this decision was appealed by Israel, the Argentinian courts agreed to re-examine possible extradition to Israel, leading to Ben-Aivgi being arrested again on March 29, 2007.

As the age of criminal responsibility in Argentina is 16 years, and Ben-Aivgi was 14 at the time of the murder, Argentina's court agreed only to extradite him for the robbery. During the process, Ben-Aivgi was placed under house arrest pending a decision, and on June 10, 2009, it was reported he and fled Argentina. On May 15, 2010, he was arrested in Mendoza, Argentina for forgery and failure to comply to a public servant, and later sentenced to 3.5 years.

After serving his sentence for his crimes in Argentina, on November 20, 2013 Ben-Aivgi was extradited to Israel, only for the robbery in 1998. While the prosecution requested that he will serve the entire 5-year sentence, in June 2014 the court accepted Ben-Aivgi's request to consider his time being jailed in Argentina, 1533 days, as time served, which would have had him released on August 19, 2014. The prosecution appealed the decision to the supreme court, where it was decided that he will be credited only 29 days, the time spent jailed while waiting for his eventual extradition.

Ben-Aivgi was released after the completion of his sentence on October 21, 2018.

In the media
In 1998, Buzz, an Israeli narrative film based on the two, was released.

In 2005, "Derek Roth - The Case Reopened" (Hebrew: דרק רוט - התיק נפתח), was shown in the Israeli television channel Yes Doco (Hebrew: יס דוקו).