The State Prosecutor’s Office has announced it will be filing a criminal indictment against R’ Shimon Shar, the deputy mayor of Netanya affiliated with the Sanzer Chassidus. The indictment is pending a pre-indictment hearing. Simultaneously, the prosecutor has announced the investigation against Netanya Mayor Miriam Fierberg is being closed.

The State Prosecutor announced the Economic Crimes Unit will be moving ahead with an indictment against Shar, expecting to charge him with fraud, breach of trust, and other white-collar crimes.

The mayor was under investigation for conflict of interests regarding planning and registration, allegedly favoring persons with whom she is acquainted regarding initiating city projects. In one case, regarding the Coral Project, the mayor herself purchased land and she was alleged to have taken bribe money to advance the project.

The deputy mayor was questioned on suspicion that he had requested and received various benefits as bribes from interested parties in real estate in the city in his capacity as chairman of the subcommittee for planning & construction in the local planning & building committee in Netanya.

After a series of discussions on evidence and their significance, which took place with the participation of the State Prosecutor’s Office and police, in which the findings of the investigation were examined in the matter of the mayor, the State Prosecutor decided to adopt the position of the Economic Crimes Unit, that although the mayor did not behave as expected, her actions were not sufficient to bring an indictment against her.

In the case of Deputy Mayor Shimon Shar, the Director of the Economic Crimes Unit decided to accept the position of the Deputy State Prosecutor to summon Shar to a pre-indictment hearing. In the letter of suspicions sent to Shimon Shar, he was presented with suspicions that he committed a series of offenses of taking bribes, fraud and breach of trust. According to the letter containing the suspicions, the deputy mayor of the municipality asked for and received donations from the Sanz institutions from interested parties in real estate in the city of Netanya, when he served as chairman of the Planning & Building Subcommittee in the years 1996-1996.

According to the letter of suspicion, the Minister appealed to the interested parties in the applications for the donation, knowing that they had submitted or are expected to submit requests for approval of building plans and permits to the subcommittee in the future and therefore would find it difficult to refuse his requests for donations. As a result of Shar’s requests, the interested parties transferred more than NIS 3 million to Sanz institutions.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)