 September 27, 2004 17:46 | Updated September,
28, 2004 12:01  Former
minister Segev sentenced to one year's probation
By Yaakov Katz THE Tel Aviv Magistrates Court
on Tuesday sentenced former energy minister
Gonen Segev to probation for one year and a
NIS 50,000 fine on charges of credit card fraud and
attempting to receive benefits
fraudulently. Segev was convicted in the court on Monday.
President of the Magistrates Court, Judge Edna
Bekenstein, ruled that Segev is a "liar", who
consistently changed his version of the events in
order to mislead the police. "The defendant is an intelligent and smart man
who was proven to have used a credit card
fraudulently and was caught in his wickedness,"
Bekenstein said. "There is only one truth but
according to the defendant there are man variations
of the truth." Segev, who is also
standing
trial for allegedly
attempting to smuggle 30,000 Ecstasy pills into
Israel from the Netherlands, reported that his
credit card was missing during a trip to Hong
Kong in November 2003 but carried on buying
groceries with the card and using it to take out
cash from ATMs. Upon returning to Israel, Segev filed a
several-thousand shekel suit with the Isracrad
credit card company in order to retrieve the money
that he said was charged to the card following his
report that it went missing. However, an
investigation launched by the credit card company
abroad revealed a picture of an ATM where Segev is
seen using the card to take out money after his
report that the card was stolen. After presented
with the evidence against him, Segev dropped the
suit. Bekenstein wrote that there is no doubt of
Segev's guilt in the affair and that the different
deceiving versions which he presented throughout
the investigation and the court proceedings
strengthened that determination. In a hearing last week, Segev shocked the police
after he presented a new version of the events,
saying that he was not in Hong Kong when his card
was used to withdraw money. Segev initially told
investigators that he made a mistake filing the
suit with the credit card company and that he got
mixed up with the dates and with a different
card. According to an indictment filed in May, Segev,
a pediatrician by profession who served as energy
minister under Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
in 1995, attempted to smuggle drugs into Israel
from the Netherlands hidden inside candy wrappers.
According to police, Segev rented an airport locker
in Amsterdam and placed the drugs inside. After he
lifted off for Israel, airport authorities opened
the locker and discovered the drugs hidden inside
the M&M wrappers. 
Our
dossier on The Mossad, Israel's Intelligence
service-
Former Israeli
minister Gonen Segev arrested for drug
smuggling | Segev
indicted for smuggling 30,000 'Ecstasy'
tablets | Former
Israeli minister Gonen Segev investigated also
for cheque (check) and credit card
frauds-
Israel's links to the
global ecstasy trade ... -
-
International
Ecstasy smuggling racket: three Israelis
arrested
-
Israelis
at center of the international Ecstasy drug
trade
 -
Ecstasy:
A gift from "our best friend and
ally"...
Ultra-Orthodox
couriers ran drugs for major international ring,
reports Reuters-
international
money-laundering ring run by New York Hasidim
washed millions of dollars in cocaine proceeds
for the Colombian cartels
-
Real
History, Drug rings, and Israel: Reports from
DEA field offices state young Israelis claiming
to be art students and had been attempting to
penetrate DEA offices
-
Police
raid Michel Friedmanns house for cocaine.
Drogenrazzia beim Vizepräsidenten des
Zentralrates der Juden in Deutschland, Michel
Friedman.
-
-
|
write to David
Irving