First publication: Contradictions in the testimony of Eldar Dayan's friends revealed
Omri Peretz and Maxim Barberman, suspected of murdering their friend Eldar Dayan, claimed they fled to an open area after seeing a police car, but records show it arrived only half an hour later. Peretz's phone, which he claimed was lost, was found at his family's home, and police suspect that important data was deleted from it.
First publication: One of the central issues in the investigation into the murder of the late Eldar Dayan is why his friends, Omri Peretz and Maxim Barberman, along with Dayan himself, entered the open area near a gas station and why they claim they split up after abandoning their vehicle. Immediately afterward, contact with Dayan was lost, and his body was later found in the same location.
Peretz and Barberman, suspected of Dayan's murder, provided explanations during their interrogation, but their testimony contradicts the established facts.
During their interrogation, they claimed that a police car arrived at the scene and they were convinced that the officers had come to arrest them due to their involvement in a brawl with five young men from Petah Tikva, so they fled to the open area and split up. They told investigators that after they separated, they could not find Dayan and subsequently returned to Dimona by bus.
While it is confirmed that the three entered the open area, investigators are not convinced that they actually split up.
The contradiction in their testimony concerns the time of the police car's arrival. A police car was indeed summoned to the gas station by an employee who reported three young men removing license plates from a vehicle and abandoning it. However, according to police records, the patrol car arrived half an hour after Peretz, Barberman, and Dayan had entered the open area. In other words, they could not have seen the patrol car and did not flee because of its arrival.
Another contradiction relates to Peretz's phone. Recently, Peretz's lawyer handed the device over to police investigators, despite his earlier claim during interrogation that he had lost it during the brawl or in the open area. It turned out that the phone had been at his family's home the entire time. Police suspect that important materials were deleted from the device before it was handed over to authorities.
In the coming days, investigators will conduct confrontations between Peretz, Barberman, and the five young men suspected of involvement in the brawl that preceded Dayan's death. According to the testimony of the young men, before the fight, Barberman smashed the car window and threatened Dayan with murder, which strengthens the suspicion against the two friends.
