Ombudsman finds 30% of public complaints against prosecutors, police are justified

Fully 30 percent of public complaints made in 2022 against state prosecutors, including the State Attorney’s Office and the Israel Police, were found to be justified, a state ombudsman for public complaints related to the justice system finds.

Such complaints include some severe shortcomings, including one incident in which a sexual assault case involving four complainants was closed without the state attorney responsible for the case informing the complainants before the decision was finalized, as is required.

In another incident, a state attorney closed a case despite the fact that video footage from police body cameras was missing from the file and when investigative evidence indicated that such footage existed. A request by the complainant to reopen the case and use the video footage was rejected by the State Attorney’s Office.

The ombudsman says 55% of all the justified complaints related to the State Attorney’s Office, 20% to the police, 6% to the Attorney General’s Office, and the remainder split between independent prosecutors hired by the Attorney General’s Office and those in the disciplinary department of the Civil Service.

In 93% of the cases, decisions regarding complaints were made within one year, and the average time taken to deal with a complaint was 34 days.