Israeli soldier fined over baby-stealing prank

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Israeli soldier fined over baby-stealing prank

 

Lawyer Steve Pica (left) says it was a game gone wrong for Ariel Lourie (right), who jokingly threatened to kidnap a two-year-old in a St Kilda East park.

Photo: John Woudstra

 

AdvertisementSteve Butcher

December 5, 2007

 

A TEENAGE Israeli soldier has been fined $1000 after he "jokingly" carried away a six-year-old boy from a St Kilda East park, telling the child he was a kidnapper.

 

Ariel Lourie, 19, said to the terrified victim that he was "going to put you into my car boot" before giving him "five seconds to run away".

 

The Melbourne Magistrates Court heard that the boy ran screaming and crying across a road as his mother confronted Lourie and demanded: "Are you crazy? What are you doing?"

 

Prosecutor Ted Combes said Lourie replied: "I was just joking", before the woman, who could not ring police because of her religious beliefs, consoled her son.

 

Lourie, who had a charge of child-stealing struck out, pleaded guilty to unlawful assault.

 

Magistrate Felicity Broughton yesterday fined Lourie without conviction after calling last week for a psychology report on him. It found he had no mental health issues. Ms Broughton had asked defence lawyer Steve Pica: "What is going on in this young man's head that this could be a joke?"

 

She reluctantly agreed not to sentence him so as not to "interfere with (his) continued moral, ethical and employment obligations" and rehabilitation.

 

Mr Combes said Lourie, who had arrived in Australia three days before the incident on September 15, sat with his cousin at 5.10pm as the boy and his younger brother played in Greenmeadows Gardens.

 

Mr Combes said the boy later revealed he heard someone twice say "don't do it" before Lourie picked him up and cradled him "as you would carry a baby".

 

As Lourie walked towards a street that bordered the park, the boy initially thought he was a family friend.

 

Mr Combes said Lourie told the boy "I'm not Jewish, I'm a kidnapper" and said he was going to put him in his boot.

 

The mother saw him being "carried off" and had started walking towards them.

 

Lourie had crossed the street to the corner of a grove, where he put down the boy, who ran screaming and crying to his mother.

 

Mr Pica told the court that what began as a joke and a game "obviously turned horrific" for mother and child, but he described Lourie as a decent man with an "over-friendly nature".

 

Mr Pica said Lourie, who was visiting his mother while on leave from the Israeli army, had apologised in writing to the woman for "creating a real nightmare".

 

Lourie was now absent without leave from the army and would return to Israel where he "still has to be dealt with by his father for this *********", he said.

[FatB]

i wonder if an arab brother would've got the same lack of punishment..

 

i also wonder what religion she is if it prevents her from talking to the cops