Police arrested an 88-year-old man for murdering his five-year-old son decades ago, after he confessed to the killing on Saturday. The suspect was previously jailed for murdering his wife.
The man is suspected of drowning his son in the sea in Eilat in 1974, law enforcement officials said. The five-year-old’s death was initially thought to be a fatal accident.
The man, a resident of Eilat who reportedly suffers from a terminal illness, was said to have confessed at the city’s police station in order to clear his conscience.
The suspect was later named by police as Asher Goldstein. He reportedly told police that the child suffered from cerebral palsy, and that he killed him out of a sense of mercy.
Police said that Goldstein’s detention had been extended by three days on the order of a judge in the Eilat Magistrate’s Court. He is set to remain in police custody until August 27.
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Just two years after drowning his son, Goldstein killed his wife, Levana, with an iron bar he received from his friend, Israel Omri, in September 1974. He attempted to stage the murder of his wife as a car accident, according to a Davar newspaper report at the time.
After battering her to death with his weapon, he enlisted Omri, in return for 100,000 liras, to take her body in a car six kilometers (3.7 miles) outside of Eilat, then set fire to the vehicle with her body inside.
During the course of the investigation into her death, police began to suspect that she was not killed in a car accident, but rather murdered by her husband.
Omri’s son, Ron, later testified as a state witness that his father and Goldstein had committed the murder. Goldstein was convicted of the crime and served 11 years in jail, the Ynet news outlet reported.
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