Jail is the Best Place for Them

How can a jail cell be a good place for anyone? Of course it is not; but this is where those refusing to give their wife their "GET" (the term Ge’t in Hebrew is from “G’mar Tov”) can be sent by the legal system (The Rabbinical Court or the Family Court). Jail is where they’re sent but not only a jail as we will learn below.

This is the case decided on May 31st, 2011 by the Honorable "Dayanim" (Judges in the rabbinical court), Rabbis Israel Ifrach, Eliahuu Avergil, and Yosef Goldberg from the Jerusalem District Court.

The husband (refusing to give his wife a “get”) was to be released from jail after serving 10 years. The woman was an "Mesorevet Get" for all these years. Ten years is the maximum amount of time a rabbinic court can send someone to jail for this crime according to the law.

The wife asked the court to impose on her husband an extended prison term to make him change his mind. The husband`s lawyer claimed that after ten years his client was still a "refusal", demonstrating that the jail was not the place for him because didn’t cause him to change his mind at all.

The Dayanim thought that because the period of incarceration was about to end (after ten years) the husband had became stronger in his refusal; therefore they decided to send him to an isolated cell from "Leil HaSeder" until the end of Passover (indeed a drastic step).

The husband also claimed that sending him for another prison term would hurt his basic freedom rights and his dignity; an assertion that the judges responded was indeed correct but compared to the hurt and extended damage he was causing his wife for all these years, it was very proportional.

The final decision was to send the husband for an indeterminate period of time in jail after the end of the ten years and not to release him at all.

The Nuance:

The same law ("Hok Kfiat Tsiut" - Enforcing Compliance Law) also commands/obligates the rabbinic court to send the decision to the Supreme Court which has the right to change the period after hearing the sentence.

Conclusion:

Unfortunately the rabbinic courts have little power and the little power they do have they hesitate to use. It is generally a “long and tiring legal process" until a "Get Refusal" actually ends up with an extended prison term.

There are no excuses for leaving a wife "Aguna or Mesorevet Ger" and the damage against her and the children is irreparable. The law should be used much more freely and more "refuseniks" should be serving terms not just in jail but in place that they would not be able to stand.

This is not only my personal opinion but also a new bill proposed in the parliament. This bill encourages courts to send these "refuseniks" to different prisons where they will have no contact with each other because current practice places them together in the same jail where they have the freedom to strengthen each other’s resolve to hurt their wives by preventing them from marriage to a new husband. The new bill, if passed as law, will make the lives of these refusiniks’ much harder in jail and in addition to existing limitations (such as a ban leaving the country, not being able to renew a driver’s license and much more), their lives in prison will no longer be a “picnic”.

A word of hope:

As I will explain in my next article, the solution is not only in sending people to jail but also hurting them deeply in their pockets.

Huge fines are being sued by the different Family Courts in Israel, not only against husbands but wives as well, as they also can refuse to "receive the GET", denying the husband`s right to remarry - even though, depending on the case, the rabbinic court can allow the husband to take a second wife.
 

Sincerely,
 

Tzvi Szajnbrum, Attorney at Law