Wednesday, December 31, 2008

On The 6th Day Of Chanukah... Israel Retaliates... Hamas Thugs Blown To Hell


It was the 7Th day, Shabbat Kodesh, Shabbat Chanukah, Shabbat Rosh Chodesh - No ordinary day at all. This was a day in which grace after meals recitation included everything that can possibly be added to commemorate a special time in history. The "Al Hannissim" (praise on the miracles) would have extreme significance today as it had had when the Greeks (Yevanim) were defeated by the ChashmonaĆ­im (Jews) during the times of the Bet Hamikdash. Dripping with flamboyancy, many top Hamas commanders decided to partake in a 'graduation ceremony' for their new recruits, figuring Israel won't attack on Shabbat. It was a deadly miscalculation. One that would later begin another chapter in the ever escalating Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

Israeli warplanes pounded the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Saturday, killing at least 229 people in one of the bloodiest days for the Palestinians in 60 years of conflict with the Jewish state. The bullies received a dose of their own medicine. A lethal dose sure to make the 70 virgins giggle in gnawing anticipation.

Hamas estimates that in four minutes, dozens of Israeli bombers and helicopters flattened 30 "high profile" sites. At least 350 Palestinians were killed, 90 percent of them Hamas operatives.

Throughout history Jews have been persecuted. Just like the ChashmonaĆ­im - a small band of fighters - were able to battle and defeat their much larger, more powerful and stronger enemies, so too, little tiny Israel, surrounded and outnumbered by its hostile neighbors, will win and continue to win. Yes, 8 days of a one day jug of oil was a stupendous miracle of utmost proportions, but so was the brilliance in overpowering the Yevannites. Make no mistake about it. Strategically speaking, Israel by now; could have - would have - should have been annihilated.

An Israeli military spokesman said the Gaza operation is "just beginning" and would be expanded and intensified as necessary. And as DEBKAfile reports so diligent and accurately - Israel should hopefully have learned from their errors and tribulations:

While Israel's air attack is counted a success, its war chiefs are taking care not to be trapped by an early achievement into the sort of blunders which led to the Lebanon war's unsatisfactory conclusion in 2006. That campaign was commanded by a former airman, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, who saw no point in a ground operation after Hizballah's command center was razed by air – until it was too late.

There will be the usual condemnation of Israel. Should we expect otherwise? The terrorist infrastructure must be eradicated, will Israel finish the job this time round?

"There is a time for calm and a time for fighting, and now the time has come to fight," Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said.

Outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned that "it may take time, and each and every one of us must be patient so we can complete the mission."

Of course there was the expected rhetoric by baby killers/Jew haters known as Hamas.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said "Palestine has never seen an uglier massacre" and in Damascus, Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal called for a new Palestinian peoples' uprising against Israel.

"We will not leave our land, we will not raise white flags and we will not kneel except before God," Haniyeh said.

"I call upon you to carry out a third intifada (uprising)," Hamas leader Meshaal said on Al-Jazeera television.

if history is any indication, those words should not be taken lightly.
==============================================================

If you feel anger, frustration, boiling rage, anxiety, sadness, and despondency over Islamic terrorists who have made it their mission to kill and destroy the Jewish nation ---You will hopefully feel similarly in the atrocities committed by "Rabbinic leaders" who have structured a foundation of misery and facade in the name of the Torah.

http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a14422/News/New_York.html

Mondrowitz Accusers Seen Ready To Testify


by Hella Winston
Special To The Jewish Week

The Brooklyn District Attorney’s office has indicated to prosecutors in Israel that the alleged victims of an accused pedophile who fled to the Jewish state more than two decades ago will testify should he stand trial, The Jewish Week has learned.
An excerpt of the letter from the head of the sex crimes bureau was contained in a brief submitted to the Israeli Supreme Court by attorneys representing the State who have been arguing for the extradition of former Brooklyn youth counselor Avrohom Mondrowitz. He was arrested in Israel in late 2007 after a change in the Israeli-U.S. extradition treaty provided a basis for returning him to the U.S.
While a Jerusalem court ruled Mondrowitz extraditable earlier this year, he appealed that decision to the
Supreme Court, which heard his final appeal on Dec. 8.
At that hearing, the Justices asked the State’s attorneys to consider three issues: the propriety of retroactive application of extradition treaties; the prosecution’s decision to extradite Mondrowitz despite the many years that have passed since the commission of the alleged crimes; and whether Mondrowitz should be tried in Israel.
The excerpt from the letter from the sex crimes bureau chief, Rhonnie Jaus, was part of a larger brief responding to those questions and filed with the high court on Dec. 23.
“Over the last twenty-two years, these victims have had to live with this childhood trauma. Knowing that the efforts they made to testify against Mondrowitz [have] not brought them any justice [has] made living with this nightmare that much more difficult,” Jaus wrote. She was referring to testimony given by the victims to a Brooklyn grand jury, which indicted Mondrowitz in absentia in 1985 on four counts of sodomy and eight counts of sexual abuse in the first degree against four children in Brooklyn.
“Over the years when these victims, now grown men, have been contacted by our office, they have maintained their interest in the prosecution of Mondrowitz,” Jaus’ letter continued. “They are concerned for their own privacy and safety, but willing to pursue the case.”
A spokesman for the Brooklyn DA confirmed that the letter had been submitted and that the victims “have a continued interest in the case and have expressed a willingness to testify.” He also noted that Jaus’ letter communicated the fact that these victims were “in terror of Mondrowitz” in 1985.
Jaus’ letter is significant, according to Michael Lesher, a journalist and attorney who has been deeply involved in this case. Lesher says it is “the first direct statement in an official forum that specifically tells us that the original complainants are in contact with the DA’s office and [that they] are prepared and do want to proceed with prosecution. That’s an important and encouraging sign.”
Indeed, these victims’ identities have never been publicly revealed nor has any of them ever come forward to comment on the case. In fact, one of the many notable aspects of this case is the fact that the victims named in the original indictment are not from Jewish families. But comments over the years by those in law enforcement indicate that Mondrowitz may have had hundreds of Jewish victims, among them those sent to him for counseling, referred by the Brooklyn-based Ohel Children’s Home and Family Services, and other Orthodox communal institutions and individuals.
Several of Mondrowitz’s alleged Jewish victims have spoken to the media in recent years, though the statute of limitations bars them from being a part of any criminal or civil action.
Two of these men, Mark Weiss and Boruch Sandhaus, also wrote letters to the Israeli Supreme Court, as part of an amicus brief submitted to the Court by Survivors for Justice, an organization they helped to found which seeks to assist victims of sexual abuse in the Orthodox community obtain justice in the criminal and civil courts.
In the brief, submitted to the high court by SFJ’s pro bono Israeli counsel, the law firm Yigal Arnon & Co., Lonnie Soury, a spokesman for the group, writes that, “Returning Avrohom Mondrowitz to the United States to defend against the criminal charges will send a clear message to those who have been sexually abused in our community, and in the similarly insular haredi communities in Israel, that authorities from New York to Israel intend to do everything in their power to protect our children.”
Urging the Justices to uphold the lower court’s determination to extradite Mondrowitz, Sandhaus writes, “It is now over 20 years and Avrohom Mondrowitz has yet to face his victims in court and defend himself against the numerous horrific charges of abuse he committed against us when we were children. I live daily with the indescribable agony and torture of the memories Mondrowitz left permanently burned into my brain. Knowing that this monster is still out there amongst children just adds to the immeasurable agony I feel.”

Sunday, December 21, 2008

The Mondrowitz Case


From Vos Iz Neias----

http://www.vosizneias.com/24589/2008/12/21/brooklyn-ny-lawyer-asks-ag-mukasey-to-intervene-in-mondrowitz-case/

Brooklyn, NY - Lawyer Asks AG Mukasey To Intervene In Mondrowitz Case

Brooklyn, NY - Michael Lesher, an attorney who has pursued the Mondrowitz case for more than ten years, and who now represents six men who are among the hundreds of Mondrowitz's alleged victims, has written to Attorney General Michael Mukasey to inform him of the critical posture of the case. The Justice Department, headed by Mukasey, is actively seeking Mondrowitz's extradition, which was ordered by Israel in November 2007 but which Mondrowitz appealed to Israel's Supreme Court.

Lesher, who says he has never been paid for any of his work on this case, wrote to inform Mukasey that the arguments Mondrowitz presented to a panel of the Supreme Court on December 8 -- which seemed to be favorably received by at least one of the three judges -- were clearly contrary to the law and the facts of the case, in Lesher's opinion. His letter cites legal precedents and a previously unpublished document which allegedly disproves Mondrowitz's claim that the current extradition request is untimely.

Lesher expresses particular concern about the idea discussed at the December 8 hearing of trying Mondrowitz in Israel instead of Brooklyn, where all of the crimes for which he was indicted were allegedly committed. Based on documents he has obtained over ten years of research and FOIA appeals, Lesher argues that having Mondrowitz tried thousands of miles away from his alleged victims "would likely result in a grossly inadequate sentence, which would hardly serve the interests of justice -- or of the victims." He notes that Mondrowitz was indicted for thirteen counts of first-degree sodomy and first-degree child abuse, among other charges.

The Attorney General has not responded to the letter. The only American politician that has made any comment about the Mondrowitz case, is Brooklyn Asmblyman Dov Hikind who released the following press release:

“I am deeply disappointed by the recent reports that Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz may not be extradited from Israel to the United States to stand trial for his heinous and criminal actions. This development is a great set-back in the war on sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community.

The Supreme Court of Israel should reconsider their decision to give state prosecutors additional time to determine if Mondrowitz can instead be tried in Israel, where he will surely face a lesser sentence.

"I urge the Israeli authorities to cooperate with Brooklyn DA Charles Hynes to set the proceedings back on course to ensure that this pedophile will finally be brought to justice. After 25 years, the Mondrowitz victims deserve no less.” said Hikind.

Letter Of MICHAEL LESHER, ESQ To AG Mukasey On The Mondrowitz Case==================================================================

Michael Lesher Says:

I'm pleased to see this post. Maybe readers would like some contact information in case they have comments for public officials involved in this case:

Brooklyn D.A.'s office, sex crimes unit head: JausR@BrooklynDA.org and Orthodox community liaison: WhiteH@BrooklynDA.org.

U.S. State Department, the public communication division phone: 202-647-6575. The main switchboard is 202-647-4000.

Israel's Ministry of Justice, public inquiries fax: 011-972-2-646-6357.

Israel's High Court, Public Affairs Department. Phone is 011-972-2-675-9612 and 011-972-2-675-9613. I believe their email address is: tlunotrasham@court.gov.il and the fax number is 011-972-2-651-3191. Bear in mind it's not proper to try to influence judges, but people can certainly express their interest in the case and in continuing to follow it.

Tizku l'mitzvos.

===================================================================

Last update - 00:00 10/02/2008

Court rules to extradite alleged U.S. serial molester Mondrowitz

By Ofra Edelman, Haaretz Correspondent

Alleged child molester Avrohom Mondrowitz can be extradited to the United States, the Jerusalem District Court ruled on Sunday.

Mondrowitz, a member of the Ger Hassidic sect in Brooklyn who posed as a rabbi and psychologist specializing in treating troubled children, fled to Israel in 1984 as New York law enforcement authorities were preparing to arrest him.

In 1985 he was charged with sodomy and other sex crimes against five minors, aged 9 to 15, from the ultra-Orthodox community in Brooklyn. The case first came to light after a report in Haaretz Magazine (November 17, 2007).

The U.S. Justice Department twice applied for his extradition, but legal hurdles prevented this until now. The first extradition request was denied because at the time, 22 years ago, sodomy was not an extraditable offense under the IsraeliAmerican extradition treaty.

The treaty was amended in January 2007, making it possible to extradite anyone who has been charged with a crime that carries more than a one-year prison sentence.

The U.S. submitted a second extradition request in September 2007, and two months later Mondrowitz was arrested in Jerusalem.

In Sunday's court decision, Judge Nava Ben Or ruled that since legal reasons prevented bringing Mondrowitz to justice, the statute of limitations on the crime with which he was charged stopped running the moment Mondrowitz arrived in Israel.

With the statute of limitations still valid, she ruled, he can be extradited to the U.S.

Related articles:
  • Court rules alleged U.S. pedophile Mondrowitz must stay in custody
  • 'I planned to murder Mondrowitz'
  • ===================================================================

    http://www.internationalextraditionblog.com/2008/02/extradition-of-abraham-mondrowitz.html#_ftn1e

    Thursday, February 14, 2008

    Extradition of Abraham Mondrowitz Approved by Israeli Court

    An Israeli court recently approved extradition to the U.S. of an American Orthodox Jew, according to the Justice Ministry.[1] Abraham Mondrowitz, a member of the Gur Hasidic Jewish sect, was wanted on suspicion of multiple sexual attacks that occurred over twenty years ago.[2] Mondrowitz, now 60, was arrested in Jerusalem in November of 2007 for the alleged abuse of a number of children at his home in Brooklyn, New York which also doubled as his private clinic.[3] He fled to Israel in 1985 while police were still investigating him for these charges.[4]

    Moshe Cohen, the spokesman for the Israeli Justice Ministry, noted that while the Jerusalem District Court had approved the extradition order, Mondrowitz still retains the right to appeal.[5] The final decision on whether to extradite Mondrowitz will ultimately be made by the State, according to Court spokeswoman Tal Rosner.[6]

    In September of 2007, the United States resubmitted an extradition request for Mondrowitz that was originally made a few months after he had fled New York for Israel in 1985.[7] According to the Israeli state prosecutor's office this renewed U.S. request follows the amending of the extradition treaty between Israel and the United States to include those crimes whose punishment is more than one year imprisonment.[8] Prior to the change, which took effect last year, sodomy was not included in the extradition treaty between Israel and the United States.[9]

    For an individual to be extradited the offense charged must be a crime in both the country requesting extradition as well as the country to which such request is made.[10] To fulfill this obligation, it is not required that the name of the offense allegedly committed in a foreign country nor its elements be identical to the name and/or elements of a similar offense in the United States.[11] It is sufficient that the conduct involved is criminal in both the requesting and requested countries.[12] If the particular crimes alleged are criminal in both jurisdictions than any dual criminality provision in the applicable treaty is satisfied.[13]

    Federal criminal defense attorney Douglas McNabb has written extensively on extradition law and has been quoted in articles pertaining to the case of Abraham Mondrowitz. Some of Mr. McNabb’s articles on International Extradition law can be found here. For further information on the Mondrowitz case click here.
    ===================================================================

    http://www.theawarenesscenter.org/Mondrowitz_Avrohom.html

    The Awareness Center is the Jewish Coalition Against Sexual Abuse/Assault (JCASA)
    www.theawarensscenter.org

    Case of Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz, M.Sc., Ph.D., L.N.H.A

    (AKA: Abraham Mondrowitz, Avraham Mondrowitz, Avremel Mondrowitz)

    This page is dedicated to all of those who were sexually victimized by Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz; and also a dedication to those who lost their lives as a result of the crimes committed against them.

    Born - Poland

    Tel Aviv, Israel

    Chicago, IL

    Psychologist, Ohel Childrens and Family Services - Brooklyn, NY

    Fundraiser, Jerusalem College of Technology - Jerusalem, Israel


    December 3, 1984 -- Brooklyn District Attorney Elizabeth Holtzman's office said Mondrowitz was named in an arrest warrant charging him with two counts of sex abuse". At the time, Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz worked in special education school for boys in Brooklyn, that had connections with Ohel Children and Family Services in Brooklyn, New York. He was responsible for about 20-25 young children who already had either emotional problems and/or learning disabilities.

    October 11, 2007 -- Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes finally signed papers requesting the U.S. Justice Department extradite Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz back to the United States. Fled to Israel months after charges were first brought up against him twenty-three years ago.

    November 16, 2007 -- Israeli police arrested Avrohom Mondrowitz, a Gur Hasid who was suspected of sexually abusing children in the United States was arrested pending extradition orders to the U.S.

    November 18, 2007 - At the extraditon Hearing for Alleged Serial Child Molester, Rabbi Avrohom Mondrowitz, the judge extended Mondrowitz's detention until November 27, at which point he will decide whether Mondrowitz will remain in jail or be placed under house arrest. Mondrowitz's attorney, David Ofek, said he plans to appeal the decision to keep Mondrowitz in custody.

    November 29, 2007 - The Israeli Minister of Justice released that Mondrowitz's extradition case is being handled by the Department of International Affairs of the Office of the State Attorney (prosecutors Nili Gesser and Marlene Mazel-Herskowitz) and in cooperation with the Israeli Police's Interpol Department.


    Avrohom Mondrowitz is originally from Chicago, the son of a highly respected rabbi.

    Mondrowitz, who was born in Poland in 1947, relocated as a child to Tel Aviv and later moved with his family to Chicago. He is the son of a prominent rabbi. In the late 1970's Mondrowitz moved to Brooklyn, NY in the late 1970s and presented himself to Orthodox educational institutions as a rabbi and clinical psychologist.

    While in New York Modrwoitz provided psychological treatment to children from the mixed Jewish-Italian Borough Park neighborhood where he lived. He also opened a yeshiva for children with behavioral problems.

    Four children, all from Italian families and all neighbors of Mondrowitz, complained of sexual abuse perpetrated by Mondrowitz. Jewish victims also eventually testified against him, but only after the statute of limitations had expired.

    In 1985, a New York State court charged Mondrowitz with eight counts of child abuse in the first degree, endangering the welfare of a child and five counts of sodomy in the first degree.

    Mondrowitz and his family fled to Jerusalem after a warrant was issued for his arrest.

    At the time of the indictment, sodomy of boys was not an extraditable crime, since it was not defined as rape under Israeli law. In 1988, the Knesset changed that law, apparently opening the way for Mondrowitz's extradition.

    ===================================================================

    http://www.villagevoice.com/2006-07-18/news/silence-of-the-lam/

    Silence of the Lam
    Accused of Sexually Abusing Young Boys, a Brooklyn Rabbi Lit for Israel 22 Years Ago. Now One Alleged Victim Wants Him Brought Back for Trial

    By Kristen Lombardi
    The Village Voice
    July 25, 2006

    http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0630,lombardi,73955,2.html

    Abe vividly remembers that wall. The "bragging wall," as he's come to call it, was crammed with certificates and diplomas. He remembers fixating on that wall as the Hasidic psychologist advised him on how to be a good boy. He fixated on it, too, when the psychologist sat beside him, the man's hand shoved down his pants, stroking Abe's genitals.

    Abe was eight years old, the defiant son of a devout Orthodox Jewish family who was sent to the child psychologist in Borough Park, Brooklyn. Every Sunday for four months in 1984, he'd go for counseling in the modest house on 60th Street. Sessions started with talk of his behavior—his mischief at home, his disobedience at yeshiva. Goals were set, rewards promised. Then, Abe alleges, the psycho- logist's hand would be in his underwear.

    "He would fondle and play with my genitals," says Abe, now a thirtyish businessman not willing to publish his last name. For this former Borough Park resident, whose Orthodox faith taught him to revere elders, the encounters were devastating. "I felt very odd, ashamed. I didn't know what to think."

    Out of the shadows: Abe asked the Brooklyn D.A. to reopen the case against Rabbi Mondrowitz.
    Photo by Tacy Kranitz


    Abe hid the abuse for two decades, not telling a soul, yearning to get on with life. Until, in May, he discovered what had happened to the man he claims molested him: He got away.

    That child psychologist was Avrohom Mondrowitz, Abe says, the same one charged with sexually abusing four Brooklyn boys in February 1985. Once a popular radio host whose Orthodox audience had known him as "Rabbi," Mondrowitz skipped town before police could arrest him. He surfaced later in Israel, where he's lived for two decades. (Mondrowitz, now 58 and reportedly in Jerusalem, could not be reached for comment.)

    Abe isn't one of those four boys. He stopped his sessions in the summer of 1984, never to see Mondrowitz again. All these years, he's had no idea his alleged abuser was indicted for molesting kids, on charges that included sodomy. Abe learned of the outstanding case from a mention in a May 22 New York article about an ultra-Orthodox rabbi accused of sexual abuse.

    Seeing the name in print left Abe stunned. He went online, discovering postings about the self-styled rabbi on sites for Jewish survivors of sexual abuse. Reeling, he contacted an attorney. And last month, he identified himself as a victim to the office of Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes.

    Explains Abe, "I could tell this guy was guilty as heck and I had to do something. He needs to be brought to justice."

    The D.A.'s office confirms that Abe appeared at its Jay Street headquarters in June. Prosecutors interviewed him and recorded his complaints. Hynes can do little about the allegations because they fall outside the five-year statute of limitations for sex offenses, according to Rhonnie Jaus, chief of the sex crimes bureau. All Hynes can do is try to use Abe's testimony as supporting evidence against Mondrowitz at trial.

    Jaus maintains that Hynes is still pursuing the 1985 case. The indictment against Mondrowitz is pending; her bureau remains in touch with the original victims, now in their thirties.

    "We stand ready, willing, and able to prosecute him for his heinous crimes," Jaus states. "If he returns to this country, we would arrest him. We would prosecute him. We would do everything we could to achieve justice in this case."

    But there's a lot more Hynes could be doing to achieve justice, it seems. The one person who can reopen the push for extradition is the Brooklyn D.A.; he calls the Justice Department, Justice calls State, State calls Israel. That's how it works. Michael Lesher, the New Jersey attorney who represents Abe, believes Hynes could force Mondrowitz to stand trial, if only Hynes would take a more aggressive stance. Past efforts to extradite Mondrowitz failed only because of a technicality. Under a 1962 treaty, the United States and Israel have agreed "reciprocally to deliver up persons found in its territory who have been charged with . . . offenses mentioned [and] committed within the territorial jurisdiction of the other." This U.S.-Israel extradition treaty lists 31 crimes, including rape. You might think the sodomy charges against Mondrowitz would fit that category. In 1985, though, Israeli law defined rape narrowly as "having sexual intercourse with a woman without her free consent." Oral and anal raping of boys—among the acts of which Mondrowitz is accused—weren't crimes by Israeli standards.

    Today, that loophole has been all but closed. Israel has amended its rape law to recognize males as potential victims, making the act of forcible sodomy a crime punishable by 20 years in prison. Lesher argues the change opens the door to revisit the case. "In theory," he says, "there's no reason for Hynes not to request extradition."

    Extradition lawyers second his opinion. Richard Bierschbach, who teaches criminal law at Cardozo Law School and who has worked on such cases, tells the Voice, "I think he would be extraditable now." Changing the law, he says, effectively changed the treaty. Courts have ruled that modifications to treaties can be applied retroactively, without violating a fugitive's due-process rights. "You can say with a fair degree of confidence that sodomy is now an extraditable offense."

    Even Mondrowitz's attorney suggests that extradition isn't out of the question. Reached in his Tel Aviv office, David Ofek says he didn't believe the charges against his client when defending him in the 1980s, and he doesn't now, calling them "all lies." Mondrowitz has not been charged with a crime in Israel. Nor has anyone accused him of child molestation there. In a heavy accent, Ofek adds, "I found him to be a marvelous and gentle person, and I don't think he's touched a child."

    Still, Ofek acknowledges that sodomy is a crime equal to rape in Israel—one that, in general, is extraditable. "It's a very serious crime," he says, "and we don't like people like that."

    So does that mean his client could be extradited? "After 20 years," he tells the Voice, "try to do it."


    Mondrowitz was a celebrity to start, a Hasidic Frasier of sorts, hosting the call-in program Life Is for Living at the now defunct WNYN radio station, doling out advice over the airwaves. But in a five-page criminal indictment, prosecutors painted Mondro-witz as an insatiable abuser who allegedly preyed on four boys, ages nine to 15, over four years. The 13 counts against him include eight of sexual abuse in the first degree, five of sodomy in the first degree.

    The indictment may tell only a fraction of the story, says Sal Catalfumo. Now retired, he was the main sex crimes detective who investigated Mondrowitz for four months beginning in November 1984, when the Brooklyn South precinct got an anonymous tip about a rabbi. "There were a lot of kids and a lot of allegations," he says.

    Catalfumo identified about a dozen victims to then Brooklyn D.A. Elizabeth Holtzman, whose office pressed charges on the four strongest cases. He had interviewed dozens more, he says. Initially, investigators had suspected Mondrowitz singled out Orthodox Jewish children who attended his special-education class at a Foster Avenue yeshiva or his child-counseling practice on 60th Street. Catalfumo says he ended up discovering victims from Italian Catholic families living on the same street as Mondrowitz did. Some served as altar boys at a nearby church. Others played with his seven kids. Two were prepubescent sons of Catalfumo's former high school classmate.

    "Children told me and my partner that he would be molesting them in one room while their parents would be waiting in the next," Catalfumo recalls. When police searched the office, he says, they uncovered child pornography in the desk drawers.

    By the time police had drawn up an arrest warrant, in December 1984, Catalfumo says, "The guy was gone. He escaped, and he's never had to face the music." All these years later, the former investigator cannot quite put this unresolved case behind him. He cannot quite forget about those, like Abe, who claim to be victims.

    Confides Catalfumo, "Personally, I'd like to catch this guy. He shouldn't be able to evade prosecution for the rest of his life."


    The Mondrowitz case has also haunted Abe's attorney. Lesher's made a lonely campaign out of researching it, filing freedom-of-information requests to obtain classified records. Beginning in 1999, he spent two years collecting documents from the U.S. State and Justice departments chronicling the feds' battle to extradite the fugitive—a battle that stops in 1993, courtesy of Hynes. Lesher shared his files with the Voice for this article. (The Justice Department declined to comment on the case, referring questions to State; its spokesperson refused even to speak generally about the U.S.-Israel extradition treaty.)

    The paper trail starts just as the indictment was about to come down. In January 1985, according to the records, D.A. Holtzman's office began pushing the feds to bring Mondrowitz back to Brooklyn for trial, calling the Justice Department. Two months later, her office made a formal request for "the provisional arrest in Israel of Avrohom Mondrowitz." Prosecutors sent along materials for extradition in September, and kept in contact with their federal counterparts for the next two years. Internal records suggest that Washington officials felt substantial pressure from Holtzman.

    "Natives of Brooklyn are becoming restless," reads one February 1986 memorandum, "and we are receiving calls from Kings County District Attorney's Office."

    Another cable, dated November 1986, reports that the Israeli official on the case "has from time to time been in telephonic communication directly with the prosecutor's office in New York City to discuss the matter."

    Yet another, from March 1987: "Relay the gist of this development to prosecuting attorney handling this case [who] had phoned on February 17."

    Now a Manhattan attorney specializing in government relations, Holtzman declined to discuss her office's efforts to seek extradition. "I can tell you that we didn't sit on cases like that in my office," she says.

    Still, these early requests were stymied. As early as 1985, Israeli officials had informed the U.S. that rape, under Israeli law, didn't cover sodomy. "The Mondrowitz case as presented cannot be acted upon under the terms of the existing U.S.-Israel extradition agreement," states an April 1985 cable.

    Federal officials got creative and asked Israel to consider expelling Mondrowitz, then an American citizen on a tourist visa. For years, the case sat in a kind of legal limbo.

    And then, in February 1987, after a change in leadership, the Israeli Interior Ministry ordered Mondrowitz deported to Brooklyn. Ofek appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court, asking for a stay and seeking access to the U.S. extradition package. It included four affidavits from John Doe victims. It also included a letter, purportedly written by a Borough Park social worker, charging that Mondrowitz had infected 28 boys with HIV/AIDS. The claim would be stunning now; back then, it was made more so by the fact that so many people didn't understand the virus.

    "When you say, 20 years ago, that the man had infected children with AIDS, it means that the man would kill children," Ofek says. There were no drug cocktails in 1987. Not many hospitals in Israel could administer an HIV test. Eventually, Ofek says, his client found one. The results came back negative. The court threw out the deportation order. "The United States wanted extradition and the Israeli government wanted to deport him—and I stopped it."


    To hear Hynes's office tell it now, extradition represents the one barrier to prosecuting this case. Just last May, Jaus says, her bureau reviewed its files and consulted with Israeli legal authorities, as well as federal officials. The verdict? "Under the current treaty," she reports, "he is charged with a non- extraditable offense."

    Or not. In 1988, Israel amended its rape law to cover the act of homosexual rape. Internal federal letters make note of the change, urging a second look at extradition.

    "An amendment to the Israeli penal code . . . presents us, we believe, with an opportunity to reopen the extradition case of Avrohom Mondrowitz," reads one March 1988 telegram from the American embassy in Tel Aviv to the State Department in Washington, D.C.

    Interestingly, no records show that federal officials called Holtzman to relay the news. And there is nothing to suggest that her office was keeping abreast of the developments, or even knew about the change. Just when the U.S. may have gained proper grounds to extradite Mondrowitz, the paper trail fades.

    But if Holtzman missed a key opportunity, Hynes has apparently plain sat on the case. He became the D.A. in 1990. In the federal file, there is no record of any activity from Hynes on the matter until 1993, when Justice officials called his office. That's when he all but dropped the case—approving a decision to end extradition attempts for good.

    As one September 1993 Justice Department letter details, prosecutors "contacted our office and advised that they would not be pursuing the case any further at this time."

    "Hynes has never been hot to extradite Mondrowitz," charges Lesher. Why would Hynes allow a fugitive to evade prosecution through an old loophole, especially when a new victim has come forward to testify? "It's a compelling argument," observes Mary- ellen Fullerton, who teaches international criminal law at Brooklyn Law School. "If I were the Brooklyn D.A., I'd consider it."

    Bruce Zagaris, an extradition lawyer in Washington, D.C., notes that the U.S.-Israel treaty is being updated, and that the new protocol would make it even easier to deliver up someone, like Mondrowitz, whose alleged acts haven't fallen neatly into the list of specified offenses. The protocol would replace the list with a provision defining any offense extraditable "as long as the crime is punishable by one year or more and as long as it's a crime in both countries."

    So, Zagaris offers, "Yes, I'd say this guy is extraditable. And under this new protocol, there is even more of a chance that he could be."

    At the very least, argues Bierschbach, the Cardozo professor, "you cannot flat-out say that he's not extraditable. You can make the argument, but it's weak."

    Even so, Hynes spokesperson Jerry Schmetterer maintains, flatly: "After reviewing the files and consulting with authorities, our position remains that under the current treaty, Mondrowitz cannot be extradited. . . . He was charged with sodomy and the treaty has changed. It's our position this change is not retroactive."

    Told that experts say otherwise, he snaps, "That's fine. You write your story. This is the position of the district attorney."


    Maybe Hynes has his own reasons for not pushing extradition. In Brooklyn politics, the Orthodox community can wield considerable influence. Political consultant Hank Sheinkopf explains, "They vote, and they vote in large numbers often." He estimates that the Orthodox population accounts for some 30 percent of the borough's electorate, from Williamsburg to Crown Heights, Borough Park, Flatbush, and Midwood. Especially in ultra-Orthodox areas, rabbis tend to pick candidates and congregants cast votes accordingly.

    "The rabbis are very important because they tell their followers who to get behind," says Sheinkopf. For a politician, he says, that means "you have to play to them."

    Hynes has worked hard to court the community over the years. In 1990, he became the first D.A. in the city to convene a Jewish advisory council, which kept leaders abreast of cases involving Jewish defen-dants or complainants. The council is now defunct, says Schmetterer, replaced by the office's full-time liaison to the Hasidic community, Henna White, herself a Lubavitcher. (He refused to let the Voice interview White for this article, saying, "It wouldn't be her place to talk about this case.") Hynes has been commended for launching such initiatives as Project Eden, a Hasidic-sanctioned program that reaches out to ultra-Orthodox victims of domestic violence.

    Aaron Twerski, the dean of Hofstra Law School and a former council member, describes Hynes's relationship to the Orthodox community as "quite positive." He explains, "Hynes is a presence in the community. He's been responsive."

    But Hynes has bumped up against the community before. The most dramatic example came in 1999, when the D.A.'s office charged a prominent Hasidic rabbi named Bernard Freilich with witness tampering and intimidation for allegedly making death threats against an Orthodox woman who was to testify in a sex-abuse case. The community reacted with fury, organizing demonstrations, accusing Hynes of anti-Semitism. Freilich wound up acquitted at a 2000 trial.

    Lesher says the D.A. has a habit of backing down from prosecutions that Orthodox rabbinical leaders would rather handle themselves. He has researched two instances where the D.A. initiated criminal proceedings against accused Hasidic abusers, only to let them fizzle. In each, he notes, "it was community opposition that spelled the difference."

    With Mondrowitz, the Orthodox community hasn't exactly clamored for justice. No one dared talk publicly about the scandal when it broke. Catalfumo says rabbis refused to answer questions, parents refused to file complaints. Even those who wanted to see Mondrowitz punished—or dead—wouldn't cooperate with authorities, the detective says, for fear their kids would become tainted by a trial.

    Catalfumo doubts the D.A. would do anything to upset the Orthodox community today, and he doubts the community would want to revisit the case. "Let's face it, I don't think they're interested in seeing this surface again," he says. Indeed, Orthodox rabbis and politicians who remember the Mondrowitz case declined to talk about it with the Voice. One Borough Park resident with ties to the same Hasidic sect as Mondrowitz offered this opinion: "Once a case has been put to sleep, it's best to leave it alone."

    Twerski, of Hofstra, advocates "zero tolerance" in the community for sexual abuse. But when told about the newly vocal Mondrowitz victim and his desire to reopen the case, Twerski replies, "I don't know what to say about that. That's an old, old case and I'm not going to comment on it."

    Jaus, for her part, bristles at the suggestion of special treatment. In 2000, her bureau got word from State officials that Mondrowitz was returning to the States. It contacted the original four victims. It had D.C. police ready to arrest him. He never showed up.

    "If we heard this information again, we'd do the same thing," she states.

    Those words offer little consolation to Abe. Sitting in the dining room at his attorney's suburban home, Abe hunches over the table, his arms across his chest, his eyes on his Blackberry, as he relays what he told prosecutors on June 7. How Mondrowitz had begun molesting him during a counseling session one day, and wound up making it routine. How the psychologist had even invited him upstairs, and fondled him there.

    Abe had hoped his testimony would inspire Hynes to push for extradition, he says. "I came away with the realization that my experience is a footnote in a case the D.A. won't do anything about."

    At least, Abe believes, not without incentive. So on June 24, he contacted an anonymous blogger known as Un-Orthodox Jew, who has posted controversial diatribes about sexual abuse and cover-up in the Hasidic world. Abe posted his own entry, writing:

    "MONDROWITZ ALERT! ALERT! ALERT! ALERT! ALERT! Has anyone contacted you as being a victim of Avrohom Mondrowitz? . . . There is renewed interest in this case & . . . I am trying to find out if other victims have also recently come forward so that we can pool our resources & pressure the DA's office."

    So far, he's received little response, though two Orthodox Jewish men who claim to be victims of Mondrowitz have contacted the Voice, expressing a desire to bring him back.

    To Abe, it all seems so upside down—the way Hynes didn't push for extradition in 1993, the way he won't now. That his alleged abuser can live in Israel, his whereabouts known, yet run around scot-free, seems almost as bad as the abuse.

    As Abe confides, "That makes it seem like a big slap in the face by the D.A."

    ===================================================================

    http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a14279/News/New_York.html

    Mondrowitz Extradition Case Thrown Into Limbo

    Avrohom Mondrowitz being led into a Jerusalem courtroom for a hearing last year shortly after his arrest on charges that he sexually abused children in Brooklyn two decades ago.Getty Images
    Avrohom Mondrowitz being led into a Jerusalem courtroom for a hearing last year shortly after his arrest on charges that he sexually abused children in Brooklyn two decades ago.Getty Images

    by Hella Winston
    Special To The Jewish Week

    The latest twist in the long-running extradition case of alleged Brooklyn pedophile Avrohom Mondrowitz has apparently thrown the case into limbo and for the first time in decades raised the specter that Mondrowitz might be tried in Israel.


    In what is being seen by some close to the case as an unexpected move, the Israeli Supreme Court last week gave prosecutors representing the state until Dec. 23 to gather additional information on whether Mondrowitz — who was charged with sexual crimes against children in Brooklyn over two decades ago — can be tried in Israel.

    Given that a lower court in Israel earlier this year had already deemed Mondrowitz extraditable, observers were optimistic that last week’s final appeal would result in a decision to send

    him to Brooklyn to stand trial. Instead, questions raised by the justices have generated concern that this may not happen, though no decision has yet been made.

    “[Some of the justices’ questioning] really seemed to come out of left field,” said Michael Lesher, an attorney who represents several Jewish adults who allege that they were molested by Mondrowitz as children. “I’m simply surprised, considering that there was a 40-page, detailed decision written by the lower court which really [went into] all the issues,” Lesher said.

    Some of those issues relate to the possible implications of recent changes to the U.S.-Israeli extradition treaty and an Israeli statue providing for the timely prosecution of crimes.

    On Dec. 8 Israel’s highest court heard an appeal from attorneys representing Mondrowitz, a former Brooklyn youth counselor who fled to Israel under charges of child sexual abuse and is now in the final stages of extradition proceedings that began with his arrest in Israel in November 2007. A Jerusalem court had deemed Mondrowitz extraditable earlier this year, but he is now challenging that determination in the Supreme Court.

    The Mondrowitz saga began almost 25 years ago, when, in 1984, he fled to Israel and was indicted in absentia on four counts of sodomy and eight counts of sexual abuse in the first degree against four non-Jewish children in Brooklyn. (While Jewish children were among Mondrowitz’s alleged victims, they were not part of the grand jury that indicted him and thus not part of this case).

    Then-District Attorney Elizabeth Holtzman pursued Mondrowitz’s extradition, but was thwarted in 1985 when Israeli officials informed the United States that extradition would be impossible because sodomy was not included in the Israeli definition of rape and thus, under the existing terms of the U.S.-Israeli extradition agreement, was not an extraditable offense (as was rape).

    While federal documents reveal that the U.S. subsequently asked Israel to consider expelling Mondrowitz, no action was taken. Then in 1988, Israel amended its rape law to cover the act of homosexual rape. While a telegram from the American Embassy in Tel Aviv to the State Department in Washington, D.C., noted the change, it is unclear from the record whether Holtzman was ever made aware of it.

    In 1993, three years after he was elected Brooklyn district attorney, Charles Hynes approved a decision to end extradition attempts for good. Hynes’ office resubmitted an extradition request in 2007, however, after a change in the treaty between the U.S. and Israel was made that provides for the extradition of suspects who face at least a year in prison, regardless of the offense.

    While Lesher and some experts have challenged the notion that extradition would have been impossible prior to the 2007 change in the treaty, this turn of events nonetheless created a sense of optimism about the possibility that Mondrowitz would be returned to Brooklyn to stand trial — until now.

    According to a transcript of last week’s Supreme Court hearing, one of the justices asked whether, in light of the fact that the scope of extraditable offenses is broader than under the previous treaty, it is consistent with Mondrowitz’s fundamental rights to extradite him under a treaty that took effect after the crimes in question have been committed.

    Further, because Israel has a statute that someone charged with these crimes would have to be brought to trial within 10 years of the alleged offense, questions of timeliness were also raised by the justices.

    According to Lesher, “the unstated issue that is not clarified here is whether that 10-year limit would apply if the suspect is not returned for trial even after an extradition request is made.”

    Lesher believes that neither of these issues should bar Israel from extraditing Mondrowitz. Citing a prior case dealing with the issue of retroactivity and apparently referenced by the lower court, Lesher said, “I think this case law shows very clearly why the retroactive application of an extradition treaty does not raise ex-post facto concerns. ... I am surprised that the issue came up in the hearing.”

    The justices also raised the possibility of trying Mondrowitz in Israel and, despite objections by the state’s attorneys citing the logistical difficulty and expense of such a prospect, asked the state to consult on it further.

    The attorneys for the state did not return an e-mail seeking comment.

    According to documents obtained by Lesher, the issue of trying Mondrowitz in Israel was raised once before, in 1986. An internal Justice Department memo from that year asks, “What sentence is reasonable to expect would be imposed on Mondrowitz were he tried and convicted on our case in Israel?”

    The memo then cites Marvin Hankin, senior assistant to the state attorney in Israel, as estimating that Mondrowitz might serve a total of “2-3 years,” noting that “there are very few sodomy cases in Israel.”

    An even more pessimistic estimate is found in an embassy cable to the State Department, dated Nov. 3, 1986. “The possibility of bringing the case to trial in Israel has been bandied about. In addition to the usual problems of transportation of witnesses and compatibility of evidentiary standards, however, there apparently is another factor that might weigh against any leap toward this option: under Israeli law, it seems that it would be possible that, even if convicted, Mondrowitz could face as little as 18 months imprisonment,” and even less “with time off for good behavior.”

    According to Lesher, under New York law, Mondrowitz could spend “several decades in prison” if convicted of multiple counts of Class B felonies with which he is charged.

    A spokesman for Hynes, whose office requested the extradition last year, says the district attorney is “watching the process very carefully and is prepared to deal with the result no matter which way it goes.”

    Survivors for Justice, an organization formed by people who were sexually abused as children in Orthodox communities and that counts several alleged Mondrowitz victims among its members, is working with a law firm in Israel to prepare an amicus brief asking the Israeli high court to uphold the lower court’s determination to extradite Mondrowitz.


    A spokesman for the group told The Jewish Week that “We believe that after 25 years of justice deferred, Mondrowitz’s victims deserve to see him returned to Brooklyn and tried by the Brooklyn DA, who has on many occasions stated his commitment to see justice done in this case.”

    ===================================================================

    From The Unorthodox Jew Blog (UOJ)

    http://theunorthodoxjew.blogspot.com/2008/12/mondrowitz-extradition-at-stake-too.html

    As Israel's Supreme Court approaches a final decision on whether or not to extradite Mondrowitz to stand trial in Brooklyn -- we're talking about the man police believe sodomized or sexually abused hundreds of boys, nearly all Jewish -- the silence around the process is deafening! All the more so because things may not be going smoothly.

    We know Mondrowitz has powerful supporters in Israel. And the shameful record of Brooklyn D.A. Charles J. Hynes in this case shows he'd be only too happy never to have to prosecute Mondrowitz... never to have to expose his enablers and accomplices in the community... never shine a light on a case his office has avoided ever since he took office. Well, IF WE STAY QUIET -- HE MAY NOT HAVE TO!!!

    The Jewish Week is already reporting that Israel's top court may be considering a "compromise" by which Mondrowitz isn't sent back -- and gets tried, IF AT ALL, in Israel... probably meaning a much lighter sentence, and certainly keeping other guilty parties -- the D.A., Ohel, the rabbis who covered for Mondrowitz for years, and anybody he may have traded victims or kid porn with (who knows?) -- conveniently out of the picture.

    I've learned more. And it's not comforting!

    Israel's Supreme Court has ordered the State's attorneys (who have been pushing for extradition) to file additional papers by TUESDAY, DECEMBER 23. The judges -- who apparently didn't manage to read the record or the lower court's 40-page decision that explained in detail why Mondrowitz should be sent back for trial -- are suddenly worried that the alleged child rapist's "rights" may be jeopardized if he gets sent back so many years after his crimes were allegedly committed. Never mind that his prosecution is certainly timely under New York law -- because he was a fugitive since 1984, New York's "speedy trial" time limit didn't run. But maybe, asked the judges, it's all America's fault, not the alleged rapist's? Maybe America caused all the trouble by not renewing the extradition request until 2007?

    Now, remember: NOBODY wanted Mondrowitz put on trial until WE got active and started demanding it -- with information in our hands provided by committed people like attorney Michael Lesher and Mark Weiss, and Michael's other (anonymous) clients. Israel refused Elizabeth Holtzman's extradition request in 1985; the Shas Party's Yitzchak Peretz refused to deport Mondrowitz after that; Roni Milo, the next Interior Minister, refused to deport Mondrowitz in 1987 after promising he would; then Charles Hynes got elected D.A. in 1989 and pulled the plug on the case.

    Remember how the documents Michael Lesher finally extracted from the State Department showed that Hynes closed the Mondrowitz case, saying he wouldn't seek Mondrowitz as long as he stayed in Israel? Because he knew damn well that Israel didn't want him brought to justice any more than Hynes did!

    Well, they still don't want it -- and now the dodge they seem to be trying is claiming that since America dropped the ball on the extradition request, it's not fair to Mondrowitz to send him back to Brooklyn after all... now that a wised-up community is not just listening to the Herbert Bomzers and other "rabbis" who said (you saw it on TV!) "Leave him alone." We want justice! -- and they know it -- and that's exactly what they DON'T want.

    Okay: the facts. Michael has given me permission to post two things here. One is a copy of a document that proves the "America dropped the ball" argument is false. Oh yes, Hynes, dropped the ball (if he ever carried it in the first place); it was criminal of him to drop the case, it was unpardonable of him not to use all his efforts to try to get this animal returned to face his accusers. BUT, this embassy cable from September 9, 1988 shows that even back then, after Israel's criminal law expanded to include sodomy, leading Israeli officials were not interested in extraditing Mondrowitz UNTIL A NEW EXTRADITION TREATY WAS SIGNED... which didn't happen until 2007.

    CLICK ON DOCUMENT TO ENLARGE!

    Read it and weep -- with anger! Mondrowitz's lawyer is lying, and if he gets away with it, Israel's Supreme Court will be lying too!! I'm also posting (with Michael's permission) an urgent letter he faxed to the Attorney General. The letter outlines the legal reasons why there should be NO question about sending this wanted, indicted multiple felon back to Brooklyn for the trial he deserves -- finally!

    The amazing this is, with so much in the balance, NO ONE IS SPEAKING. Not the State Department (which ought to want to see its own extradition request carried out); not our Justice Department; not Israel's Ministry of Justice; and certainly not D.A. Charles Hynes!! Not a word from any of them!

    Why not? Well, actually, we don't have to ask that... do we? What DO we have to do? Obviously, DO THE TALKING!! Our voices helped push the D.A. into finally asking for extradition in the fall of 2007; the publicity we generated got Mondrowitz arrested in Israel in November 2007; now we need to go public again! Let's let the people in charge know that we're watching this case, and if there is any dodge, any deal, any mealymouth about Mondrowitz's "rights," ANYTHING that keeps him from being sent back for trial -- we're going to have to know the reason why! And someone may pay for it!! No justice -- no peace!

    Here's some contact information for people who ought to hear from the public: At the Brooklyn D.A.'s office, there's the sex crimes unit head:

    JausR@BrooklynDA.org. You can let her know we'd appreciate hearing her voice, and her boss's, loud and clear, saying that Mondrowitz's extradition to Brooklyn is very important to the justice system and the entire community. She and Hynes have said they want to prosecute Mondrowitz: this is the right time to say that again, strongly. You might also ask her if she's sitting on the Mondrowitz file to frustrate a Freedom of Information Law request made over a year ago, in order to shed light on Hynes' recent actions in the case -- and still not responded to! You can also contact the D.A.'s Orthodox community liaison: WhiteH@BrooklynDA.org.

    At the U.S. State Department, the public communication division phone: 202-647-6575. The main switchboard is 202-647-4000.

    Israel's Ministry of Justice, public inquiries fax: 011-972-2-646-6357.

    The message for these characters is that we're watching this case closely, we believe the law and facts clearly favor extradition and we hope their efforts toward achieving that result are completely successful.

    Finally, there's Israel's High Court, Public Affairs Department. Phone is 011-972-2-675-9612 and 011-972-2-675-9613. I believe their email address is: tlunotrasham@court.gov.il and the fax number is 011-972-2-651-3191.

    Bear in mind it's not proper to try to influence judges, so the message there is more or less: we are very interested in this case and its status; we know its history; we intend to continue to follow its progress. If they get enough calls, the word is sure to filter through. Remember: final briefs are being filed on TUESDAY, DECEMBER 23. A decision from the court will follow. If we wait until a dirty deal is announced -- God forbid! -- it will be too late.

    THIS IS THE TIME TO MAKE OUR VOICES HEARD. Let's show that there are still responsible citizens out there, and Jews who care more for the victim than the criminal!

    ==================================================================

    UOJ is amazing at what he does best - uncovering what was covered up by the slime buckets and dreks of the earth. Please do not stay silent. Most importantly, use the contact information above for the powers that be to force the extradition of Abraham Mondrowitz to the U.S.A. NOW!!!!!!!

    The 3 documents below are courtesy of the UOJ blog.

    http://theunorthodoxjew.blogspot.com/2008/12/mondrowitz-extradition-at-stake-too.html


    Friday, December 05, 2008

    Sex Abuse In The Jewish Community - Many Still In Denial





    http://www.wpix.com/landing_fact_finders/?Shocking-Sex-Abuse-Allegations=1&blockID=152046&feedID=1128

    Fact Finders
    Shocking Sex Abuse Allegations

    MARY MURPHY REPORTING

    December 3, 2008

    Dark secrets are emerging from a local, religious community that's known for its modesty and old world values.

    PIX 11 has learned that a prominent, Orthodox Jewish leader will meet with the Brooklyn District Attorney to talk about allegations of sexual abuse in religious schools and homes.

    Mary Murphy has more in a Fact Finders report.


    FOR MORE INFORMATION:

    Survivors For Justice email address: info@survivorsforjustice.org

    Hotline Number: 1 (877) 735-1420

    Contacts: Joel Engelman
    Mark Weiss
    ==================================================================================

    Thursday, November 27, 2008

    The Jewish Week continues to tackle the Dov Hikind drama


    by Hella Winston
    Special To The Jewish Week
    Ever since Brooklyn Assemblyman Dov Hikind revealed two months ago that he had assembled files on “hundreds” of people alleging sexual abuse at the hands of Orthodox rabbis and yeshiva employees, he has been under scrutiny both from inside and outside the Orthodox Jewish community.
    Now, two weeks after Hikind was served with a subpoena by an attorney representing alleged sexual abuse victims, that scrutiny has intensified.
    While many have praised the Brooklyn Democrat for bringing much-needed attention to this issue, early criticism of his efforts came, perhaps surprisingly, from some of the victims’ groups and advocates. They argued that Hikind, while deserving of credit for trying to shed light on the problem, had actually harmed their cause by attempting to deal with the
    issue within the Orthodox community. The best route, they claim, is to take such cases directly to law enforcement, who are in the best position to investigate allegations and alone have the power to arrest, prosecute and register offenders.
    Michael Dowd, an attorney representing alleged victims of Rabbi Yehuda Kolko, a former teacher and principal at Yeshiva Torah Temimah in Brooklyn, recently subpoenaed Hikind for records and testimony regarding rabbis and yeshiva employees who have allegedly sexually abused children, and rabbinic leaders who may have protected the abusers. Dowd is interested in any information Hikind may have gathered that could be relevant to his clients’ cases.

    Continue reading full article here:

    http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a14102/News/New_York.html
    ===================================================================================
    If Dov Hikind is so enraged and sickened by the Rabbi on-boy sex epidemic - as he portrays himself to be - he would demonstrate it with his actions by cooperating with Michael Dowd.

    Dov: We know Al Sharpton is an Anti-Semite. Trivia question for you. Someone who refuses to reveal the name of child molesters to law enforcement is Anti________?????



    Thursday, November 20, 2008

    Malevolent intentions displayed by the Central Rabbinical Congress (CRC) - Anti-Zionist - Pro-sexual predators


    Albert Einstein:

    The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it.

    Aldous Huxley:

    At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytizing zeal on behalf of religious or political idols.


    Blaise Pascal:

    Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.


    Helen Keller:

    Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all -- the apathy of human beings.

    Leonardo da Vinci:

    He who does not punish evil, commands it to be done.

    ====================================================================================

    http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a14069/News/New_York.html

    Anti-Abuse Rabbi Says He’s In Danger

    by Hella Winston And Larry Cohler-Esses
    A Williamsburg community activist who has spoken out frequently against child sexual abuse in the Brooklyn Orthodox community claimed Monday that his life had been threatened multiple times as a result.
    Rabbi Nuchum Rosenberg claimed that the threats culminated last month when he was “shot” on Berry Street, near the Williamsburg Bridge by unknown assailants.
    Speaking at a press conference outside the 90th Precinct Police Headquarters in Williamsburg, Rabbi Rosenberg complained that police were unable to protect him. He pointed to a scarlet wound seared in the middle of his forehead to indicate the spot where he was hit.
    But in interviews he gave before and after the press conference, Rabbi Rosenberg said he was actually uncertain just what hit him on the forehead,
    Delta
    saying it could have been a pellet gun or even a rock.
    “A car flew by as I was walking, and I felt something hit me,” he told The Jewish Week. “I didn’t see what it was.”
    Police sources confirmed Rabbi Rosenberg had filed at least three complaints about being harassed or threatened over the last several months. But he acknowledged that he filed a complaint about the attack on him last month several days after it had occurred. Rabbi Rosenberg said the assault took place on Oct. 16, the fourth day of Sukkot, but that he went to the police only after the eight-day Jewish holiday.
    Rabbi Rosenberg, 58, said that prior to this incident he was threatened twice at gunpoint by an unknown person speaking Hebrew who warned him to close down a telephone hotline he operated. The Yiddish language hotline featured recorded messages on which Rabbi Rosenberg addressed a host of sensitive community issues, including child sex abuse, and on which he made often incendiary charges.
    On one recorded message obtained by The Jewish Week, Rabbi Rosenberg denounced various individuals by name as an “extortionist,” and a “mafia thug.”
    The hotline messages also offered educational warnings to children and their families about what to do if confronted by molesting teachers or other adults and advice on how to protect against it.
    On both the recorded messages and at his press conference, Rabbi Rosenberg claimed that a group in the Williamsburg community known as the Meshmeris Ha’Tznius, or Guardians of Modesty, protected pedophiles and other sexual offenders in exchange for money.
    “It’s a gang,” he said at the press conference. “They’re getting white envelopes with green leaves inside.”
    Law enforcement officials and community leaders have long reported that victims of sex crimes in insular, ultra-Orthodox Brooklyn communities frequently will not go to the authorities, severely limiting their ability to investigate and prosecute such crimes. Most attribute this to social strictures and community and rabbinic pressures against turning to outside, secular authorities that would expose the community to external scrutiny on matters considered shameful.
    State Assembly Member Dov Hikind says he has compiled dossiers of at least 1,000 cases of child sexual abuse in Brooklyn Orthodox communities, based on first-hand accounts of victims and their families who have come to him. Many involve molestation of children at the hands of yeshiva teachers and rabbis, he says. But “99 percent” will not go to the authorities, he told The New York Times.
    Benzion Twerski, an Orthodox psychologist who agreed to serve on a community panel formed by Hikind to address the issue, resigned last September after one week, citing communal pressure on him and his family.
    But at his press conference, Rabbi Rosenberg said that in exchange for extortion payoffs by perpetrators, Meshmeris Ha’Tznius in Williamsburg protected sexual predators from exposure and pressured the families of any victims that might think of going to the authorities not to do so.
    On his hotline, “I said who they are and what they are,” he said. “I told the stories that they tried to extort $10,000 from this one and $10,000 from that one.
    “I even told them stories that when a girl was raped, they went to the rapist and they took out the money from him, and they never gave help to the girl that was raped. They tell the father don’t you dare have anything to do with the people that are trying to investigate. It’s against the Jewish law.”
    Rabbi Rosenberg’s claims could not be independently confirmed. But there is no doubt the hotline provoked a fierce firestorm of denunciation against Rabbi Rosenberg.
    Last July, 33 rabbis signed a public condemnation of Rabbi Rosenberg published in Der Blatt, a Yiddish language weekly paper based in Williamsburg.
    “He speaks all kinds of dirt that the mind can’t tolerate, that come from places that are impure and makes other people impure,” the ad said, warning readers not to call his hotline. “He should stop from his bad ways and shut his dirty mouth.
    “This destroyer is like a stone that is thrown at the Jewish people, and his position is like a transgressor who makes the public transgress,” the ad said.
    The rabbis stated that Rabbi Rosenberg should not be allowed to pray with any congregation and that no one should hire him as a consultant on the building of ritual baths, which is his profession.
    Yitzchak Glick, a member of the Central Rabbinical Congress, a body that represents many of the rabbis who signed onto the ban, declined to comment about the decree or Rosenberg’s allegations.
    Another tract, distributed anonymously throughout Williamsburg, depicted a twisting snake with Rabbi Rosenberg’s head superimposed over the serpent’s, his forked tongue sticking out.
    “Cursed are you from every wild animal,” the leaflet decried, citing him by name. “The name of this evil person should be obliterated. Get out unholy one. Obliterate the snake (Nuchem Satan) from all corners of the world.”
    The ad by the 33 rabbis and others signed by the “Meshmeris Ha’Tznius” denounced Rabbi Rosenberg as a moser, one who endangers a Jewish community by informing on it to secular authorities.
    Historically, in the shtetls of Europe, when Jews were persecuted, someone found to be a moser could be put to death. But “there is a general consensus today that this doesn’t apply,” said Rabbi Mark Dratch of JSafe, a group dedicated to preventing child abuse and domestic violence in the Jewish community. “I would [assume] that none of these rabbis were literally calling for his assassination. That said, I am not saying that they did not mean to intimidate him. He was being intimidated.”
    ====================================================================================

    http://www.hasidicnews.com/news25.shtml


    Satmar Squabble Rages On

    By GIMPEL the SHISTER, HasidicNews.com Writer

    WILLIAMSBURG (HN) - The squabbling between the two Satmar Newspapers "Der Yid" and "Das Blat" rages on.

    Originally "Der Yid" was the only Satmar newspaper. When the Satmar Congregation split into the Zalmen and Aaron teams, Der Yid ended up as expected in the hands of Zalmen. Aaron's people launched "Das blat as a way of asserting their independence and counter the pro-Zalmen Der Yid.

    One of the ironic outcomes of this inner squabbling is the shedding of some traditional no-no's like pictures. Der Yid never used to show any pictures. Das Blat in an attempt to attract readers and perhaps convert them to their cause, started showing pictures. Der Yid quickly followed suit.

    One notable prevailing attitude is for one paper not to discuss any news occurring in its opponents team. This is somewhat odd, but quite common in the Satmar world. Ever since Satmar started fighting Belz about 15 years ago, Satmar official media never mentioned anything about Belz, including The Belze Rebbe's highly-publicized visit to the US about seven years ago.
    ====================================================================================

    http://theawarenesscenter.blogspot.com/2008/11/rabbi-nachum-rosenberg-victim-advocate.html

    Rabbi Nauchm Rosenberg has been advocating for Jewish survivors of sexual violence in Williamsburg/Borough Park (Brooklyn) New York for over 35 years. Over the last several months he had his life threatened if he did not close down a hotline. A little over two weeks ago there was a drive by shooting in which someone shot a him. Please listen to him tell his story and demand that he is protected. His goal is to help survivors make police reports and testify in court to help put an end to sex crimes in his community and around the globe.

    NOTE: this is a four part series. Please watch all 4 parts. (Click link above to watch video)

    Thursday, November 13, 2008

    Question: Is Dov Hikind guilty of Aiding and Abetting???


    New York Times

    http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/13/nyregion/13hikind.html?ref=nyregion


    November 13, 2008
    Sexual Abuse Complaints Subpoenaed
    By PAUL VITELLO

    Since last year, when Assemblyman Dov Hikind invited his radio show listeners to discuss an explosive topic — sexual abuse of children in the Orthodox Jewish community — he says he has collected more than 1,000 complaints and the names of 60 accused sexual predators.

    He has kept those stories under lock and key in his Brooklyn office, he says, because the people who said they were victims had sworn him to secrecy, fearful of becoming outcasts in a community where perceived troublemakers risk losing employment, housing and even marriage prospects.

    But a prominent lawyer representing a half dozen former yeshiva students who say in a civil lawsuit that they were sexually abused by a teacher in Borough Park, Brooklyn, had Mr. Hikind served with a subpoena this week, demanding that he surrender those files.

    Mr. Hikind has refused. “I will go to jail for 10 years first,” he said on Wednesday.

    The legal conflict has revealed a deep tension within the Orthodox community that has been reported in the Jewish weekly press, and has been the almost exclusive topic of discussion on some Orthodox Jewish Web sites like http://failedmessiah.typepad.com/ and http://theunorthodoxjew.blogspot.com/ in the months since Mr. Hikind brought up sexual abuse.

    “I’ve been shocked and overwhelmed at the magnitude of the problem,” said Mr. Hikind, an Orthodox Jew and a Democrat who represents the predominantly Orthodox community of Borough Park.

    The victims have come to his office in a steady stream to tell their stories, he said. “Abusive teachers and rabbis in the schools,” he said. “Pedophiles on the streets. Incest in the home.”

    Michael G. Dowd, the lawyer who had Mr. Hikind served with the subpoena, has been a leading advocate for plaintiffs who say they were abused by Roman Catholic priests. He represents six men who say they were abused by Rabbi Yehuda Kolko, a teacher at Yeshiva Torah Temimah in Brooklyn. Rabbi Kolko, who was charged with sexual abuse in 2006, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and has left the school.

    Mr. Dowd’s subpoena demands that the assemblyman turn over not just complaints that Mr. Hikind may have received against Rabbi Kolko, but “any and all reports of sexual abuse at any yeshiva and/or by any rabbi or employee of a yeshiva in New York City.” Mr. Dowd said they were crucial to proving his clients’ contention that sexual abuse was commonplace and routinely covered up by administrators in yeshivas.

    He described Mr. Hikind’s refusal as “misguided.” While he said that he planned to have the subpoena enforced, he also said that he understood the reluctance to cross the powers that be in the Orthodox community. “The lead rabbis have the kind of power to shut people up that the Catholic Church had 50, 60 years ago,” he said.

    Mr. Hikind said that every complaint he received was in complete confidence, with the understanding that “under no circumstances would their names be known in the community.”

    “There is no way in the world, when people have come to me and spilled their hearts out to me, and shared the most intimate and private things with me, hoping I will do something to address the larger, overall issue, that I would ever betray their trust,” he said.

    Mr. Hikind said he was responding to talk in the community about unreported sex abuse when he decided to devote three shows in a row to the topic on his weekly radio program, which is broadcast Saturday nights on WMCA-AM (570). The response was immediate and broad, coming not only from Brooklyn but from upstate New York and New Jersey as well.

    He has been trying to enlist leaders of the Borough Park community to help deal with the problem, with mixed success. “There is a cultural taboo about this kind of thing, and especially about going to secular authorities with sexual abuse issues,” he said.

    In September, a clinical psychologist who initially agreed to head a task force on the issue, Rabbi Benzion Twerski, resigned after a week. In a letter to a Jewish weekly newspaper, he said he left under pressure brought by his children, who told him they were made to feel “shamed” by his participation.

    Mr. Hikind said that of all the people who said they had been victims, “99 percent would not go to the police under any circumstances — that is just the reality.”

    But Joel Engelman, 23, who grew up in the Orthodox community of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and who helped found a group of victims called Survivors for Justice, said that while “well-intentioned,” Mr. Hikind had a classic misunderstanding about sexual predators that is embedded in insular communities like the Catholic priesthood or the Orthodox world. “The community cannot police itself,” he said. “This has been shown again and again.”

    In his own case, Mr. Engelman said, a complaint he brought to the attention of administrators at the United Talmudical Academy against a teacher who sexually violated him when he was 8 years old led to the teacher’s brief suspension and subsequent reinstatement. Mr. Engelman has since brought a civil suit against the teacher and the school.

    Prof. Marci Hamilton, a visiting professor at the Yeshiva University School of Law and an expert in sexual abuse by religious leaders, said Mr. Hikind’s refusal to turn over the names of alleged predators, if not his entire case file, was “outrageous.”

    She said that Charles J. Hynes, the Brooklyn district attorney, “should already have convened a grand jury” to investigate.

    Jerry Schmetterer, Mr. Hynes’s spokesman, said, “If someone has information about a sex crime, he or she should bring that information to our sex crimes unit, and we will investigate what needs to be investigated.”
    ===================================================================================

    http://theunorthodoxjew.blogspot.com/2008/11/dear-avi-shafran.html

    steve said...

    A very important message from the mother of a victim at the hands of a Satmar mechanech:

    Dear Friends,
    Perhaps by now you've all seen the Jewish Week article describing Dov's subpoena by Attorney Dowd in re to the T/T case. Lest Dov become a MARTYR/HERO to the cause, I'd like to share with you my experience with him in reference to my son's (Joel Engelman) case.

    To refresh your memories, Dov Hikind, on his radio program Motzei Shabbos, August 2nd, upon hearing from me Joel's story of molestation by his Menahel in Satmar at 8 1/2, the failed lie detector test of the Menahel, now Rebbi, and the subsequent firing of this pedophile (but only until Joel's statute of limitations ran out) then rehiring him in the summer as Menahel/Rebbi in Satmar Bungalows, declared loudly and vehemently "I PROMISE THIS REBBI WILL NOT BE BACK IN SEPTEMBER. IF I HAVE TO I WILL HOLD A PRESS CONVERENCE IN FRONT OF THE SCHOOL".

    Remember also the article in the Jewish Week: "Second Victim Comes Forward......." to Dov - the father of the 19 yr old victim of the same Rebbi, now publicly known as Avrohom Reichman, who came to Dov with his son's story of molestation by this same Rebbi?

    Remember also Dov's eloquent speech to us at the conference on Sept 21st at Young Israel?

    Dov was also privy to the new discovery of a molestation incident with this same Rebbi last year - repeat, last year - not 13 years ago. At the conference I gave some of you the details of of an 8 yr old boy whom Reichman found standing in the school hallway because his "English" teacher had punished him. Reichman took the child into an unoccupied room (not an empty classroom, an unused room) placed the child on his lap, removed the child's belt and gave him 2 slaps with the belt. When this boy found out at the beginning of Sept that Reichman would be his Rebbi for the new zman (after Succos) he began crying and begging his mother and told her how he feared Reichman. Immediately the mother called the school, and at first they were horrifed, then called her back to say her son would not have to be in Reichman's class. She insisted that Reichman was unfit to be any child's Rebbi, but they would not agree, saying only that they were having meetings........

    In view of all of the above, on Oct 6th Dov Hikind met with 2 representatives of Satmar: David Niederman and Shulem Deutsch. It was everyone's understanding that Dov would let Satmar know in no uncertain terms that Reichman must leave - children were at terrible risk from this sneaky, insiduous pedophile even now.

    To my shock and horror, Dov came away from the meeting completely neutralized! Nay, not neutral - he is actually helping Satmar cover up and keep Reichman in the system! He said to me "Well, I know Niederman for 25 years......(I guess they need each other politically) .....need I say more?????

    So no, Dov Hikind is no hero! In my book he is an accomplice, because at the very least, if he was not successful in getting Satmar to remove Reichman, it was his great responsibility to innocent children, to have let the parents, who are being kept in the dark by the school, know that Reichman is a great danger to all children in the school, even those not in his classroom as was the 8 year old made to stand in the hallway. Instead Dov helps Satmar cover up for the school!

    As fellow participants in the conference, I ask you, can we just ignore this outrageous cover-up by one who represents himself as the champion of the cause?

    This is about "Lo Saamod al Dam Reiacha". The plain and simple truth is that Reichman is a real and known danger to the children, and all adults, especially those committed to protecting them, cannot stand idly by and do nothing. Hikind knows how real the danger is, but he's given in to the machinations of Satmar who want to keep Reichman in the system at all costs. When did Dov sell his soul to the devil? This was a test for him - it was the first Moissed he met with - he had the most damning information - and he simply folded. Because he's buddies with Niederman for 25 years? We cannot just sit idly by and wait - or we are all as guilty as the people we condemn.

    Respectully yours,
    Pearl Englman
    ===================================================================================

    Rabbi Nachum Rosenberg, Part 1

    Rabbi Nachum Rosenberg is an advocate for survivors of sexual abuse/assault. In this part Rabbi Rosenberg repeated the speech he gave at an event Cardozo Law School.

    About Me

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    It is unfortunate that it has come to this. It is a big darn shame it has come to this. It is very hurtful that it has come to this. But yet, IT HAS COME TO THIS. It has come at the price of a GREAT CHILUL HASHEM. It has come to Hashem having to allow his holy name to be DESECRATED so that his CHILDREN remain SAFE. Shame on all those responsible for enabling and permitting Hashem's name to be desecrated! When you save children you save the future. You save the future you save generations. You save generations you save lives. You save lives you have saved the world!!!!!!!