Last update - 00:00 31/03/2007
Friedmann says intends to limit application of breach of trust law
By Yuval Yoaz, Haaretz Correspondent
Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann said Saturday that he intends to limit the application of breach of trust laws.
In an interview with the Channel 2 television program "Meet the Press," Friedmann said "breach of trust is an ambiguous violation which includes many situations which ought not be included."
Supreme Court officials have in the past referred to breach of trust laws as the court's only tool in fighting public corruption.
Friedmann said that after the current wave of investigations of public officials, he will work to limit the number of investigating bodies so that the probes "are concentrated on the principle matters and not the subordinate ones."
The justice minister said, "if a minister is being given a tour at a factory and is given lunch, it is possible to argue over whether it is permissible for him to receive lunch or he must bring a sandwich from home, but that is not subject matter for legal proceedings and no one knows whether that is considered breach of trust or not."
A situation has been created in Israel, he said, in which "there is the opposite danger - if the prime minister has room for 20 industrialists on a plane to China, he first takes four legal advisers to tell him whom to take and whether to draft a legal tender."
"We are approaching a situation in which completely elementary issues can be considered breach of trust. I see a failure to differentiate between things of primary and secondary importance. When we're dealing with secondary things, there is no manpower left for what is important, and the whole system becomes faulty," he said.
"After the present wave of investigations there will be a need to consider whether we are truly dealing with what is important," he added.
Friedmann added that "there is a problem with the number of investigative bodies. For example, the state comptroller, who in principle is not meant to deal with criminal investigations, and who if he finds himself with a criminal matter must pass it to the attorney general."
"A situation in which several bodies are dealing simultaneously with investigations, when each is arriving at its own judgments, as it were, and running to the media, is not a desirable one. After this wave [of investigations] passes, we will need to examine this, along with Attorney General Meni [Menachem] Mazuz," he said.
Friedmann said that in the area of criminal law, a distinction must be made between serious violations such as organized crime, drugs, burglary and vehicle theft - which in his view warrant more severe punishment than is now given - and violations such as petty theft and breach of managerial rules, which should be dealt with through fines, not criminal indictments.
Friedmann hinted that breach of trust should also be included in the latter category.