Last update - 00:00 28/10/2007
Mazuz: Katsav may have had consensual affair with accuser
By Yuval Yoaz, Haaretz Correspondent
There is sufficient evidence indicating the possibility of a consensual affair between former president Moshe Katsav and the woman he has been accused of raping, Attorney General Menachem Mazuz told the High Court of Justice on Sunday.
In a statement made ahead of a hearing on a plea bargain struck between the attorney general and the former president, Mazuz wrote that allegations made by the complainant, "A.," were undermined by contradictions in her story, creating a reasonable doubt that the former president was innocenct and should not be charged with rape.
"There was evidence that she was obsessively jealous of another employee at the President's office who was close to Katsav," Mazuz wrote. "There was evidence that she sent Katsav a love letter and gave him presents."
The hearing on Tuesday will deal with six petitions requesting that the plea bargain be canceled.
The announcement was made in response to a legal opinion handed last week by Dr. Tsvia Zeligman, an attorney who specializes in defending rape victims, who claimed the contradictions in the woman's testimony strengthened her credibility as it adheres to known behavioral patterns of woman who have been sexually abused.
"This assumption undermines the basis of criminal law," the prosecution wrote in response. "If the contradictions in her testimony do not hurt her credibility, and if contradictions with other testimonies do not harm it as evidence, then eventually filing a sex offense complaint alone together with an expert legal opinion will bring about an automatic conviction, without having to undergo the tiring process of weighing the evidence "an absurd and unacceptable outcome."
Related articles:
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State: Evidence in Katsav rape charges was 'badly eroded'
Secret talks being held on plea bargain in Katsav rape case