Police Commissioner Roni Alsheich is to promote Commander Ilan Mor, who was found guilty of sexual harasment in a disciplinary plea bargain agreement in 2013, to the post of the Israel Police’s representative in the United States.
Mor presently serves as the commander of the traffic division. Usually police officers who are appointed to the post of U.S. representative receive the rank of brigadier general, but Mor was appointed to the post even though his rank is only commander.
In 2013, Mor was given a disciplinary trial and found guilty of two charges of sexually harassing two junior female police officers who were his subordinates.
He was originally investigated by the Justice Ministry’s unit in charge of investigating police officers, but reached a plea agreement with investigators in which he admitted to the charges, and the case was transferred to the police’s internal disciplinary court, which decided to fine him 4,000 shekels ($264) and give him a severe reprimand, but did not order him fired from the police.
A short time after his conviction, Mor was sent to study at the Israel National Defense College, a prestigious institution where senior officers from the Israel Defense Forces, Mossad, Shin Bet security service and Israel Police study.
After finishing his year of studies, he was appointed to his post in the traffic police.
The indictment filed against Mor stated that the first case occurred in 2011, when he served in a senior position in the Tel Aviv district.
He commanded a large number of police officers as part of his responsibilities, including a 28-year-old woman who had just started serving in the police.
In March 2011, late one night, he initiated a telephone call with the policewoman who was in Eilat on vacation with other officers from her unit.
Mor told her he liked her and wanted to come to see her in Eilat in order to conduct an intimate relationship with her. The woman said the conversation had “embarrassing aspects.” After she told Mor she was not interested in a relationship with him, he continued to ask the woman to conduct such a relationship on a number of other occasions.
A year later, in 2012, Mor tried to forcibly kiss a junior female police officer against her will.
The charges stated he had prior acquaintance with her family, and as a result helped her in being accepted into the police.
The policewoman began serving in the district where Mor was a senior officer, and after starting her job she invited him one day to come by her home to thank him. During their conversation, he tried to kiss her on the mouth and she asked him to stop, but he tried to kiss her again.
The disciplinary court said of Mor’s pattern of behavior, in which he used his senior rank to take advantage of his subordinates and force himself on them: “This behavior, which has the character of sexual harassment and causing humiliation by a commander to his subordinate, especially given the difference in ages, ranks and status between the two, is improper and has no place in the police force.”
