It has been about two years since the announced investigation against former Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger and according to a Channel 2 News report on Wednesday night 14 Tammuz, Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein has announced he plans to file a serious criminal indictment against Metzger which includes allegations that he accepted 7 million NIS in bribes during his tenure as the nation’s Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi.
The report stated Rabbi Metzger met with the prosecutor this week for a final hearing, permitting him to tell his side of the events before the indictment is announced. Rabbi Metzger was accompanied by prominent attorney David Libai. The state is working with a key witness, the rabbi’s former aide and driver who is testifying against his former boss after Rabbi Metzger during an earlier stage in the investigation tried blame him for the law-breaking. Once he realized he was going to be the fall guy he offered to become a state witness against Rabbi Metzger.
It was added that Libai offered a confession from the rabbi in exchange for an 18-month jail term but Weinstein refused, telling the defense counsel that such a deal is a non-starter.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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4 Responses
It seems that there are no more real Rabbi these days just like the talmud predicted before the coming of the Messiah. I say we put him in jail then lock him up to teach him a lesson.
Forget the financial stuff, when are the boys going to start singing.
How about some sort of judicial proceedings beforehand? Or is that just a waste of time and taxpayers’ money, since
the press has already decided that he is guilty until proven innocent? Not that I’m particularly a follower or admirer of Rabbi Metzger, but how about some honesty and decency?
I know the Talmud says chutzpah yasgi in tractate sotah. It seems from your comments that we’ll have no problem fulfilling that. But I’m unfamiliar with “there are no more real rabbis”. Please educate us as to the origin of that statement. I think we must realize as practicing Jews, especially these days, not to believe everything we read or hear. We’re in a society where each one is trying to bring the other down, and we must realize that WE cannot survive that way as a tsibbur. Let’s try to lift each other up, rather than bring everyone besides ourselves down. For example, I was paying a shiva call for a prominent Rabbi (a real and prominent one). In walked R’ Metzger right before the Boyaner Rebbe and the Sanzer Rebbe. He didn’t have to come the shiva. No one would have noticed or cared. On the contrary, there were a couple of snickers as he sat. But he came and was menachaim the aveilim. The gemara also says that the second BM was destroyed because of sinas chinam. I’m not saying that crimes shouldn’t be punished but let’s not let it spill over to where it does not belong.