Senior Education Ministry officials among 18 detained on fraud suspicions

Senior officials in the Education Ministry were among 18 suspects detained on Monday morning over suspicions of an alleged NIS 20 million ($5 million) systematic fraud involving the marking of high school examinations and end of term projects, police said.

Investigators suspect those involved inflated the number of hours they spent grading oral and written tests, for which they received payment from an external company financed by the Education Ministry.

The suspects also allegedly claimed to have graded a high number of tests per hour, far above the accepted rate.

Police in January launched an undercover investigation after receiving a complaint following an internal Education Ministry review of the system for marking final papers.

“During the investigation, suspicions of theft, certifying false documents and false registration were revealed,” police said.

In some cases, the suspects logged hours spent on test-marking that overlapped with their regular jobs in the education system, when they were also being paid by the ministry, police said.

In addition, some of the suspects allegedly registered family members as test examiners even though they were not authorized or trained to do so, enabling them to fraudulently bill the company for even more hours.

Hadashot news reported that among the suspects are a number of national inspectors who were responsible for religious studies as well as a former department manager who was in charge of exams at the ministry.

According to the TV report, it was the manager’s replacement at the ministry who first raised the alarm about the suspected fraud.