DUDU TOPAZ, once Israeli television’s “king of the ratings”, has taken his own life.
He was found dead in jail yesterday, where he was awaiting trial on charges of masterminding attacks on television executives.
Topaz (62) was present at the 7am roll-call at Ramle prison in the centre of country. Ten minutes later, prison guards found him hanging in the shower. Paramedics failed to resuscitate him.
Topaz was being held under round-the-clock supervision following an earlier attempt to end his life just days after he was arrested in early June. In that attempt Topaz, who had diabetes, was found unconscious after injecting himself with an insulin overdose, but he recovered in hospital.
Cameras were then installed in his cell and prison guards were ordered to check on him every 10 minutes.
Topaz’s funeral in Tel Aviv this morning marks the tragic end to the life of one of Israel’s most colourful and controversial television stars.
Throughout the 1990s he was untouchable, using his good looks, charisma and chutzpah to dominate the first decade of Israeli commercial television.
He became a household name, and the chat shows and game shows he hosted were regularly top of the ratings. Israelis were divided into two camps: those who loved and those who hated Topaz.
But in recent years, as reality television took over and younger stars emerged, Topaz’s star began to wane. Eventually his shows were taken off the air.
Topaz’s proposals for a comeback were rebuffed by television executives. The new stars, many of whom had launched their own careers as guests on Topaz’s shows, refused to return his calls.
To say Topaz took the rejection badly would be an understatement.
He was arrested in June on suspicion of hiring thugs to attack a number of Israel’s leading television executives and agents, including a woman who was badly beaten in front of her child as she got out of her car.
The trial was due to resume next week and Topaz was facing a lengthy prison term.
His lawyer, Tsion Amir, said he had warned the judges that his client’s mental state meant his life was in danger. “He should have been held in a psychiatric institution or a hospital, or bailed out and guarded,” said Mr Amir.
The lawyer also blamed the media for mounting a “massive and horrible campaign” against Topaz, effectively trying him in public before the court case got under way. Mr Amir met with his client in prison on Wednesday and said Topaz told him: “Tsion, I’m not going to make it.”
The police and the prison service have launched investigations into how a prisoner under suicide watch was able to take his own life.