The Supreme Court today (Tuesday) rejected the appeal of the prime minister’s advisers – Yonatan Oreich and Ofer Golan – against the permit that the police can infiltrate their mobiles. The hearing took place before judges Hanan Meltzer (head of the panel), Noam Solberg and George Kara.
The story begins in October 2019, when the two were questioned on suspicion of harassing the state witness in the 4000 case of Shlomo Pilber. Police investigators hacked into their cell phones and subsequently applied for court approval to issue a phone intrusion order. Their request was granted, intrusion orders for the telephones were issued, based on ‘confidential material’ brought before the court.
An appeal filed by the petitioners to the district court was dismissed. An application for leave to appeal filed with this court was partially granted and there it was held that illegal actions taken would be taken into account at the hearing, and may result in its adjournment and return the hearing to the Magistrates Court. Following the return, it was decided that the intrusion orders issued had been revoked, with the exception of the order proposed to Prime Minister Ofer Golan’s spokesman. The state appealed to the district that returned the intrusion orders to all the mobile devices. The latest decision made is regarding the appeal of the Prime Minister’s advisers on the same district decision and as stated this appeal was rejected.
Judge Solberg did rule that the police acted in violation of the law, but there was no causal link showing an impact on the subsequent investigative actions that allowed for disqualification. It was therefore ruled that there is no place, at this stage of the criminal proceedings, to examine the intensity of the violation of the rights of the suspects. Judge Kara agreed with Solberg, adding that he objected to the application of the rule of disqualification and the doctrine of protection from justice at this preliminary stage of the legal process, believing that it would severely and even fatally impair the ability to conduct the investigation and the public interest in truth-seeking.
Vice President Meltzer, asked in a minority opinion to accept the appeals and order the rejection of the request for intrusion into the mobile devices. In his view, in view of the fact that not all the parties involved in the illegal search of the appellants’ mobile devices appeared for the hearing, and that in the second incarnation of the proceedings, the police chose to file a revised mobile search request, without including the materials obtained for the illegal search. The appeal. These and other figures show, for the Vice President’s approach, that the police did not meet the burden of presenting a sufficient evidentiary basis for issuing the requested intrusion orders.
Meanwhile, Jerusalem District Court judges hearing Netanyahu’s cases rejected the prime minister’s lawyers’ request for a further delay at the beginning of the trial. As mentioned, Netanyahu demanded a delay in the continuation of the trial until it is decided whether the corporations in his cases – Bezeq, Walla and Yedioth Ahronoth – will stand trial.