From a mysterious murder in The Hague to death in a Peruvian prison: The turbulent life of Daniel Amuna
Daniel Amuna, 62, from Petah Tikva, has died in a Peruvian prison after serving about three and a half years for drug smuggling. He was previously convicted in the Netherlands for the 1990 murder of Israeli woman Miriam Sharon, but was later acquitted on appeal. ZAKA is working to return his body to Israel.
Israeli prisoner Daniel Amuna, 62, from Petah Tikva, died on Sunday in a prison in Peru, where he had been incarcerated for about three and a half years. Amuna was arrested in January 2023 at the Jorge Chávez International Airport in Lima after cocaine was found in his suitcase, hidden inside a wooden frame.
Amuna was detained on January 9, 2023, by officers from the Anti-Drug Directorate of the National Police of Peru (DIRANDRO). During a luggage inspection, officers located a picture in a wooden frame with a bag of cocaine concealed inside.
Several months after his arrest, his son Lior, then 24, was also arrested in Israel. He was taken into custody in Petah Tikva along with other suspects in a case involving the import of a carpet from Peru, which allegedly contained approximately 1.4 kg of cocaine.
From a prison in Peru to the murder case in The Hague: Daniel Amuna's past
Daniel Amuna's death in a Peruvian prison closes another chapter in a criminal career that spanned decades and crossed multiple countries. Beyond the drug offenses for which he served time in Israel and abroad, Amuna's name was linked to one of the most mysterious murder cases in the Netherlands: the death of Israeli woman Miriam Sharon in The Hague in 1990. Amuna was convicted of the murder and sentenced to 14 years in prison, but years later, the conviction was overturned, and he was acquitted on appeal.
According to Dutch media reports, 39-year-old Miriam Sharon, a mother of two, was murdered on October 8, 1990, in her apartment on Regentesselaan in The Hague. A neighbor who heard a scream found her in the hallway with her throat slit. Sharon's seven-year-old daughter was in her bed in a nearby room at the time. At the scene, investigators found a black leather coat, cigarette butts, and small scissors. A locker receipt from the Brussels train station was found in the coat pocket, and the locker itself contained Amuna's ID and items bearing his fingerprints. Despite this evidence, the investigation did not lead to a resolution at the time, and the case remained open for over 25 years.
The turning point came in 2015, when The Hague police cold case unit reopened the investigation. Advanced DNA testing revealed a match between Amuna and the cigarette butt and scissors found in Sharon's apartment. In August 2016, Amuna was arrested in Amsterdam and put on trial. The prosecution argued that he had traveled from Israel via Turkey and Brussels, went directly to Sharon's home, and left shortly after the murder. During the proceedings, testimony from Sharon's daughter, who was seven at the time, indicated that the man who entered the apartment told her mother he had been "sent." However, the motive and the identity of the person behind the crime were never established.
In November 2017, the court in The Hague convicted Amuna of murder, determining that the act was premeditated. He was sentenced to 14 years in prison. However, in October 2021, the decision was overturned: The Court of Appeal in The Hague acquitted Amuna, ruling that it was not proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the killing was premeditated, a requirement for the murder charge attributed to him.
Since the statute of limitations for manslaughter under the law at the time had expired, the court could not determine if Amuna was responsible for Sharon's death without premeditation. His conviction was overturned, he was acquitted, and the case remained legally unresolved regarding the identity of the perpetrator.
