Adelaide, Australia – Rebbetzin Faces Charges for False Funding Applications for School

Adelaide, Australia – Rebbetzin Chana Engel wife of Rabbi Yossi Engel, could face 12 counts of fraud by South Australian Police, in relation to funding applications for a school.
Police have recommended that she should be charged with four counts of false pretences and eight counts of deception.

The latest development follows a recommendation that Rabbi Engel be charged with 17 counts of fraud, comprising nine of false pretences and eight of deception.

Police made the recommendations after finalising transcripts from seven hours of interviews with more than 50 members of Adelaide’s Jewish community, relating to funding applications made by the Engels.

Police have now wound up the 10-month investigation into the couple’s alleged signatures on applications for around $50,000 to the South Australian Ethnic Schools Board, on behalf of the Spirit of David Adelaide Hebrew School, which has since been ­deregistered.

The interviews will be handed over to the police criminal investigation section and a decision will be made on whether police or South Australia’s Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) office will ­prosecute.

Rabbi Engel’s lawyer, Ron Bellman, said he would soon be meeting with his client to consider drafting a statement in response to the police developments.