Likud MK sent to prison for bribery
Tel Aviv Magistrates Court sentences Naomi Blumenthal to eight months in prison after she was convicted of bribery, obstruction of justice; MK also gets 10-month suspended sentence, ordered to pay NIS 75,000 fine; she will not be able to serve in next Knesset
The Tel Aviv Magistrates Court sentenced Likud Knesset Member Naomi Blumenthal to eight months in prison after she was convicted of bribery and obstruction of justice.
Consequently, Blumenthal will not be able to serve in the next Knesset.
Video: Yaron Brenner
The MK also received a 10-month suspended sentence and was ordered to pay a fine of NIS 75,000 (about USD 15,957).
The court accepted the request of Blumenthal's lawyers and delayed the implementation of her prison sentence by 45 days.
Blumenthal was ordered not to leave the country and to deposit her passport at the court.
Judges Ziva Hadasi Herman, Rachel Greenberg and Dan Mor decided not to judge her severely, taking into consideration her age, her clean past and a confidential document submitted to the court.
In the sentence, the judges wrote that Blumenthal hurt the purity of the elections and bought her Knesset seat. They added that it is unthinkable that Blumenthal did not know she was forbidden to give benefits to her voters, and that her behavior shows that she and her adviser understood the severity of their acts and therefore tried to conceal their them.
A month ago Blumenthal was found guilty of funding a meeting of Likud activists held in the Tel Aviv Sheraton City Tower hotel in 2002, in a bid to promote her chances in the party's primary elections. Blumenthal also paid a sum of NIS 12,000 (about USD 2,600) for the stay of 15 guests at the hotel on the eve of the primaries.
At a later stage, after the affair was leaked to the press, Blumenthal met with two of her contact people who helped organize the event at the hotel, and instructed them to give a false testimony if questioned by police.
Notably, Blumenthal was eventually ranked ninth in the Likud primary elections that year.
In their ruling, judges harshly criticized Blumenthal's conduct, stating the MK chose to act improperly. Judges also rejected Blumenthal's version for the affair, and preferred to believe a contradicting version provided by Blumenthal's former driver, who served as a key witness in the trial.
"Blumenthal hid behind her right to stay silent, while removing all responsibility for her actions from herself and trying to hold others responsible," judges wrote in their ruling, stressing Blumenthal lied time and time again during the trial.
