Police Arrests Four Suspects in Tel Aviv Mafia Boss Murder

On Monday night, police arrested four members belonging to a powerful crime family after an hours-long manhunt in connection to the murder of a rival mafia boss earlier in the day near Tel Aviv.

Belonging to the Jarushi crime family, the suspects are believed to be involved in the death of the Shlomo crime family’s head, Benny Shlomo.

The arrest

One of the suspects was arrested at the Ben Gurion Airport, while three of them were arrested when they were driving near Gadera.

The police took the four suspects in for questioning on suspicion of their involvement in the underground hit.

A pair of unknown gunmen arrived not long after 2 p.m. on Monday at a gas station in Azor, close to Tel Aviv, where Shlomo was present.

They opened fire on the mob boss, along with his bodyguard, Vladislav Povolotsky. The former died of his wounds, while the latter had serious injuries and remains in the hospital.

When the shooting began at the gas station, there was also an off-duty policeman who had been fueling his motorcycle, who pursued the shooters.

The gunmen

The gunmen rammed their car into the cop’s bike when he pulled up beside them. Luckily, the cop remained uninjured and shot at the gunmen when they abandoned they vehicle.

However, they were able to escape unharmed, as they carjacked a woman and used her vehicle to make their getaway.

Shortly before the incident occurred, an alert had been received by the police that a vehicle had departed the area of Lod and Ramle that had a duplicate license number plate.

But, they had not been tipped off about a possible underworld hit. Initially, the police had assessed that a longtime rival of Shlomo, Shalom Domrani had orchestrated his death.

The investigation

Police are looking into the possibility that Domrani could have allied with the Jarushi crime family for carrying out the hit on Shlomo.

According to the authorities, it was unlikely that Shlomo’s organization would wait very long for avenging their leader’s death.

There was a time when Shlomo had served as the right-hand man for Domrani, but had established his own organization later on.

He had also taken some of Domrani’s men, which had sparked a rivalry between the two. Shlomo had been warned by the police that he was a target.

In fact, rival gangs had also told Shlomo to steer clear of the south of the country, due to which he had shifted to the Tel Aviv area.

Up until a couple of days ago, Shlomo had been on Turkey and he had been scheduled to fly to Madrid on Monday night, the day when he was killed.

The mob boss had been called at the gas station for attending a business meeting, where he was killed. A report said that police was investigating if it had been a trap for him.

In the last year, the two crime families appear to have stepped up their attacks on one another.