Testimony which further complicated the intricate maze of testimony in the hearing of the three Revisionists accused of the murder of Dr. Chaim Arlosoroff was offered today by Dr. Rudolf Reitler, the physician who performed the post mortem examination on the body of the Arab Lutfi for whose murder Abdul Mejid was sentenced. Dr. Reitler testified that the bullet which killed the Arab passed through the body cleanly and was not left in the body. Earlier in the trial the counsel for the defense had declared that he would prove that the bullet which killed Dr. Arlosoroff was fired from the same revolver used in the Lutti killing. Police claimed they had the bullets in their possession and that different revolvers were used in the two murders.
Inspector Reuben Chazan of the Jerusalem prison testified that three Arabs from Jaffa accompanied by an Arab lawyer visited Abdul Mejid prior to his retraction of his confession that he had murdered Dr. Arlosoroff and his assertion that he was bribed by Stavsky and Rosenblatt. two of the defendants, to confess the murder. This refutes a statement made earlier by Inspector Shawski Saad that the lawyer dio not accompany the Arabs who visited Abdul Mejid in prison.
TESTIMONY IN STAVSKY’S FAVOR
Dr. Joseph Treu declared that he had examined the shoes of Issa Darwish, an Arab convict implicated in the confession of Abdul Mejid, and the shoes of Stavsky as well as plaster casts of the foot prints found at the scene of the murder of Dr. Arlosoroff. He said that while it was impossible to determine whether boots made the footprints, nevertheles, the shoes belonging to Darwish fit the plaster casts, while those belonging to Stavsky are too big to fit the plaster casts.
Zvi Rosenblatt, another of the defendants, who is alleged to have accompanied Stavsky when the latter bribed Abdul Mejid to confess the murder, confirmed Stavsky’s report of the conversation between them and added that he had helped translate a word or two. He denied having admitted to Abdul Mejid that he was the killer of Dr. Arlosoroff or that he had asked him to confess or had shown him a map of the scene of the crime. He had only spoken to Abdul once when the latter asked him about the hearing, Rosenblatt declared.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
