Stone after stone, layer upon layer, Ehud Olmert's mound of corruption and criminal proclivity has come undone. Every day, further suspicions of bribery, fraud or breach of trust are exposed. On Thursday, the police recommended filing new charges against Olmert, this time for obstruction of justice. A buildup of apparent verbal aggression, deterring journalists, intimidating witnesses and the transferring of funds has come crashing down before the public, and yet it still feels as though the whole expos is far from over. Who would have thought that just seven years after Police Maj. Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Borovsky, then on State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss' investigative team, seized computer data investigators nicknamed "the Zaken diaries," such information would only be this close to being released to the public for the very first time. Such evidence is surely the first stop in any investigation. Except the Holyland case. This week, State Attorney Shai Nitzan submitted meticulously selected recordings to the Supreme Court regarding Morris Talansky's suspicious cash envelopes. What will be left of Olmert's testimony -- the one in which he claimed to know nothing -- when his voice plays over the recordings that were given to Grunis and his colleagues as part of their request to relitigate his puzzling acquittals? Thursday saw Police Investigations and Intelligence Division Commander Manny Yitzhaki sign off on a recommendation to press criminal charges against Olmert and Navot Tel Zur -- one of his attorneys -- for obstruction of justice. And there Olmert stood before Tel Aviv District Court Judge David Rozen, dismally crying out -- how could he abandon his dear friend Shula or refuse to finance her defense? Yet the recordings, as well as the investigation, raise serious suspicions that Olmert actually purchased her muzzle. The former prime minister would hand over the money, and Zaken would refuse to testify. What more would he need? Olmert polluted his environment. That was intimated in Rozen's bold ruling. As he was sending the first of the defendants, Hillel Cherney, to three and a half years in prison, Rozen outlined Cherney's upstanding contributions -- salt of the earth, he said -- but under these circumstances, Cherney was dragged downhill and drowned in a slough teeming with Olmert-esque corruption. Police recycled the same methodology to deal with Olmert's attorney, Tel Zur. As of now, Olmert and Tel Zur are innocent until proven guilty, until the grueling process finally comes to a close. Still, a base apparently exists from which to implicate Tel Zur on obstruction of justice charges. Indeed, Olmert forced this upon him although Tel Zur was, similar to what Rozen said of Cherney, a wholesome person. His friends loved to love him and they prayed earnestly that he would go on TV and declare he was still the same Navot that they had always known. Meanwhile, things did not quite turn out that way. Tel Zur, son of the legendary combat soldier Yair Tel Zur, who was killed following the 1967 Six-Day War, was ensnared in the jaws of corruption and crime. I cannot understate just how much the heated engagement between the sons of light and Olmert and his ilk was deserving of the zeal with which it was carried out since 2006, and not because of who Olmert is, but because of his effect on people such as Cherney and Tel Zur. Navot the elder fell prey to wrongdoing. Soon, we will find out whether Navot the younger spiraled down into another kind of evil.
