ROCKVILLE -- The Israeli attorney general has asked his country's Supreme Court to review its decision blocking the extradition of a Montgomery County teen-ager accused in a 1997 killing.

Last week, the high court ruled 3-2 that Samuel Sheinbein's Israeli citizenship means he does not have to return to the United States to stand trial on a first-degree murder charge in the killing of Alfredo Enrique Tello Jr.

But Attorney General Eliakim Rubinstein filed an appeal yesterday, asking that the case be heard by the entire Supreme Court.

Lenny Ben David, the deputy chief of mission at the Israeli Embassy, said it is unusual to ask for a review and more rare to gain a reversal.

"Had the vote been 5-0 or even 4-1, it is highly unlikely anyone would have thought to go to the full 11-judge panel," said David. "It certainly shows the government's intention to get him out of Israel and back to the United States."

The decision on whether to review the case will be made by Chief Judge Aharon Barak, who was in the minority last week and warned in his dissent that Israel could become a haven for criminals with dual citizenship.

David said an appeal could be heard "in a matter of weeks."

The 18-year-old Sheinbein turned up in Israel in September 1997, two days after Tello's charred and dismembered corpse was found in a vacant house in the Aspen Hill section of Wheaton.

Sheinbein claimed Israeli citizenship through his father, who was born in the British-controlled portion of Palestine that later became Israel.

The Supreme Court ruled that a 1978 law prohibiting the extradition of citizens for crimes committed abroad took precedence over a 1962 extradition treaty between Israel and the United States.

Montgomery County State's Attorney Douglas Gansler expressed guarded optimism.

"The pressures brought to bear by people here are working," Gansler said. "People have begun to realize how wrong and how flawed the ruling is."

Pub Date: 3/02/99