JERUSALEM -- Police recommended on Thursday that no criminal charges be brought against Israeli President Ezer Weizman over cash gifts he received from a French millionaire.
Israeli radio stations, reading from a police report presented earlier in the day to state prosecutors, said investigators cited lack of evidence as a main reason not to pursue a case against the 75-year-old president.On two possible charges, fraud and breach of trust, police said they had found "sufficient evidence" to indict Weizman, but he could not be prosecuted because a statute of limitations had expired.
The police recommendation is not binding on the state prosecution service, though it is rare for such advice to be disregarded.
Police began their investigation in January amid allegations that Weizman illegally accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from French millionaire and businessman Edouard Saroussi while he was a lawmaker and cabinet minister from 1988 to 1993.
Weizman denied any business link with Saroussi and said the money was a gift and exempt from income tax. He has resisted calls from some lawmakers, members of the public and the media to quit his largely ceremonial post.
"A man whose conscience is clean is not afraid and does not flee," Weizman said in an address to the Israeli public in January shortly after the scandal broke in a national newspaper.
The irascible president, one of Israel's last remaining politically active founding fathers and famed for his outspoken manner, testified several times as part of the criminal inquiry, the first such investigation of an Israeli president.
In his January speech, Weizman implied he was the victim of bad legal advice and appealed to Israelis to judge him by his past public record that includes periods as a fighter pilot and helping to forge peace between Israel and its Arab neighbours.
The case against Weizman was among a number of corruption and sleaze scandals to beset Israel's upper echelons in recent months.
Police are investigating fund-raising activities by Prime Minister Ehud Barak's campaign officials in last May's election, ex-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's alleged failure to return state property after leaving office, and allegations of sexual assault against Transport Minister Yitzhak Mordechai.
All deny wrongdoing.