The Tel Aviv District Court rejected an appeal filed by a woman against the judgment of the Family Court, which ordered her to pay her former partner a total of NIS 3.2 million for diamonds she took from their shared residential apartment.

The couple maintained a relationship for approximately 18 years, and signed a financial agreement that regulated a complete separation of property. After the relationship hit a rocky patch and mutual protection orders were issued, the man claimed that the woman exploited her time alone in the apartment to conceal a bag containing valuable diamonds and jewelry that he had hidden in various places around the house.

The man based his lawsuit on a tapestry of circumstantial evidence, which included an agreement whereby both parties would undergo a polygraph test. The test found that the man was telling the truth and that the woman was lying. In addition, testimonies were presented from the man’s sister, who recounted the removal of the diamonds from a shared safe in the past, and from a diamond manufacturer who visited the house in 2019, examined the contents of the bag, and estimated its value at the stated amount, while emphasizing that the bag included a rare and valuable blue diamond.

Conversely, the woman denied the very existence of the diamonds in the apartment in her statement of defense and claimed that she had never seen them. She added that her former partner is a gambling offender who admitted to committing tax offenses, smuggling the diamonds from abroad, and concealing them from the law enforcement authorities, and therefore the court should not assist him in accordance with the principle that “a remedy shall not arise from a wrongful act.” Furthermore, she complained about the reliability of the polygraph test, and that the test was coerced upon her while she was in an unstable mental state.

The judges of the District Court, Naftali Shila, Einat Ravid, and Yechiel Eliyahu, rejected the woman’s claims and upheld the judgment of the Family Court. They ruled that the appellate court does not customarily intervene in findings of fact and credibility, except in exceptional cases that do not apply here.

The judges noted that the woman’s version was not credible and deviated from her arguments in the statement of defense, and even in her conversation with the polygraph expert, she admitted that she knew about their existence and had even moved the bag from one hiding place to another at the man’s request.

With respect to the criminal allegations against the man, the court ruled that the fact that the diamonds were not reported to the tax authorities or to customs does not detract from the man’s “proprietary right” to them, and does not justify the denial of his right to compensation against theft, as there is no direct causal link between the reporting offenses and the taking of the property. Regarding the value of the diamonds, the court relied on the testimony of the diamond manufacturer, which was found to be reasonable.

At the end of the proceedings, the woman’s appeal was rejected in its entirety and she remained liable for the payment of the compensation in the amount of NIS 3.2 million to the man, and was charged with legal expenses totaling NIS 55,000 and the reimbursement of the polygraph expert’s fee. Furthermore, it was ruled that the guarantee amount she deposited in court for the purpose of the appeal will be transferred directly to the man on account of the expenses awarded in his favor.

Adv. Uri Nachmani, whose firm practices family law and specializes in drafting wills, explains that: “When a partner does not possess direct evidence of ownership of property, such as a receipt, an assessment certificate, a bank confirmation, it is possible to build a circumstantial evidentiary infrastructure. This infrastructure can suffice to prove ownership of the property and lead to a factual conclusion that relies also on the combination of independent indirect testimonies that reinforce one another and are found to be consistent and credible.”

According to him: “An additional piece of evidence is the agreement to a polygraph test or an examination by another expert, the results of which are weighed as part of the overall evidentiary framework and not as an exclusive determination. Concurrently, one must strive to undermine the credibility of the opposing party: Presenting a change of position and contradictory versions, with the aim of damaging their reliability, while reinforcing the version of the suing partner.”

In conclusion, Adv. Nachmani says: “When an objective difficulty exists to prove the value of the property precisely, it is possible to request the court to assist itself with a reasonable estimation based on data actually presented. Even if the source of the property is dubious, this does not detract from the ‘proprietary right’ of the property owner – unless a direct causal link exists between it and the scope of the alleged damage. These principles were adopted and applied in this judgment.”