Attorneys for Sara Netanyahu, wife of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, met with the country's top lawyer to seek a deal to avoid prosecution for alleged misuse of public funds, The Times of Israel reports.
Netanyahu's lawyers met on Wednesday with Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit to discuss a deal in which Netanyahu would confess to the charges that she diverted about $104,000 in public funds to use for personal expenses, reimburse the government for the money, and in return the investigation would be closed without an indictment.
Netanyahu is accused of using the funds to order private meals to the prime minister's residence.
According to a statement Mandelblit made in September, Netanyahu and Ezra Saidoff, the former deputy director general of the Prime Minister's Office, knowingly created the "false appearance" that the residence had no head chef, although there was a chef employed full-time in that post, allowing them to "sidestep the guidelines," which state that the prime minister and their family are only allowed to charge the state for food ordered to the residence if there is no head chef.
"In this manner, they fraudulently received hundreds of meals from restaurants and outside chefs worth some NIS 359,000 ($102,000)," the statement said, noting that the charges being considered include "aggravated fraud and breach of trust."
This isn't the only scandal the Netanyahu family faces. The two were questioned in March about whether the prime minister pushed regulations to help Shaul Elovitch, the owner of Bezeq telecommunications company.
Police have recommended that the prime minister be charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust in two other cases as well.
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