Multimillionaire Israeli “celebrity” rabbi Yoshiyahu Yosef Pinto has accepted a plea bargain in a bribery case and could face a year in prison, an Israeli official said yesterday.

Rabbi Pinto has amassed a fortune, estimated in 2012 by the Israeli edition of Forbes Magazine at $19 million (£11.5m), by serving as spiritual adviser to the rich and powerful in Israel, New York and elsewhere in the world.

He will admit to bribing a senior Israeli police officer for access to his police file in return for which prosecutors will seek a year-long jail sentence.

The rabbi has also agreed to become a state’s witness in a separate bribery case against former police officer Menashe Arbiv who headed Israel’s organised crime unit known as Lahav 443.

Rabbi Pinto fell under investigation when police suspected that one of his aides was embezzling donations to one of his charitable institutions and selling food intended for Holocaust survivors.