Jerusalem police deployed a helicopter Wednesday to help them look for a convict who jumped out from a bathroom window in rabbinical court rather than face divorce proceedings intended to free his estranged wife of 12 years to marry again.
Shai Cohen, 40, has been in jail for six years for refusing to divorce his wife, and his lawyer thought he was ready to agree to sign divorce papers, but Cohen apparently could not face the music.
Cohen previously had entered court hearings shackled and handcuffed, but this time, authorities accepted his claim that it was demeaning.
In what apparently was a pre-arranged plan, he asked to go the bathroom. After several minutes, guards began to worry something was wrong. When Cohen did not answer their calls, they broke down the door, but Cohen was nowhere to be found.
An escape car is suspected to have whisked him away.
His wife said in the courtroom, “I knew he would do something like this. They should not have taken off the handcuffs and shackles.”
