Suspended sentence and fine: court approves Aryeh Deri’s plea bargain
Former Member of Knesset Aryeh Deri and the chairman of the Shas party, has been sentenced after signing a plea agreement with the State Attorney’s Office, in which he admitted to two counts of tax offences for which he was charged.
Former MK Aryeh Deri in court. (Shalev Shlaom/TPS)
Yesterday, the court accepted the plea agreement, which includes a fine of NIS 180,000 (A$80,000) and a one-year suspended sentence.
Judge Shmuel Herbst said that the sentence was “appropriate in the circumstances and balanced and that Deri’s share is passive.”
Deri was initially suspected of receiving large sums of money from a businessman, as well as tax offences amounting to millions of shekels, and money laundering.
After over six years of deliberations, the plea bargain has Deri admitting to significantly smaller charges.
The plea agreement does not include the legal clause of defamation, which would prohibit Deri from serving as a minister in the future.
Deri, who was previously sentenced to three years in prison for taking bribes, said following the conviction that he has decided that “I do not want to return to what was 30-20 years ago, but with my strength and time left to continue investing in the public, even if not from the Knesset. I take responsibility.”
Deri resigned from the Knesset 10 days ago, and former MK Yossi Tayeb entered the Knesset instead of him.
Politically, Deri is expected to remain the uncontested leader of the party.
This is not Deri’s first run-in with the law. In 2000, while also serving as Minister of the Interior, Deri was convicted of taking US$155,000 in bribes, landing him a three prison sentence. He was released in 2002, after serving 22 months.
Deri should be banished from the party. He has got away with too much for too long, and this plea agreement is a whitewash. Shame on all concerned.