garbage looking for garbage??? Child Molester and shatnez checker Rabbi Yehudah Nussbaum is being harbored by Yeshiva of Brooklyn's Rabbi Shlomo Mandel (among others)You see the posters and advertisements everywhere. It's on every street lamppost in Flatbush and shnorrer park. In the Shmated Neeman, The Jewish Fress, and yes.... Even the shmutzik internet. Harav Hagoan.... will be giving a drasha. Topics: Mussar. Tshuva. Evil. Bad. Wrong. Patience. Tshuva. Tshuva. Aveiras. Mitzvas. Tznius. Tshuva. Elul... Three weeks... Nine days... Rosh Hashana... Yom Kippur... Halacha... Tshuva. Text messaging, cell phone... internet...Sakana... Tshuva... And if you're objective - you start wondering about the story of the boy that cried wolf. Some of these speakers who preach goodness, kindness, forgiveness, loyalty, shmiras haloshon.... are the same inept pigs who destroyed the hearts and souls of so many. SHLOMO MANDEL: Why does this fraud still employ and support his childhood buddy Yehudah Nussbaum??? Why is he still harboring this child molester? Why does he permit him to work for Yeshiva of Brooklyn and be around kids??? Why is he still referring boys over to him??? And then he has the audacity, gall, and chutzpah to stand on the dais and spew his mussar rantings??? No! No! No! We won't tolerate this anymore! Shlomie and his brother Yankel can pose for the camera all they want and have the Shmated snap as many pictures as the memory card permits of them supposedly learning toireh together, it doesn't change the facts that these dishonest men - are fake, phonies, and frauds... feh!
Dov Hikind: Subperb article. Now let's see you put your words into action!!!!!!!
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From VIN and UOJ
Brooklyn, NY - Dov Hikind: Beyond Belief, Heart Breaking Stories I’ve Compiled On Molestation In Our Community, It’s A Cancer, My Promise I Won’t Sit Silent.
08-13-2008 - 10:50 AM
The avalanche of stories of molestation and sexual abuse is overwhelming, personally and professionally. The first-person accounts of abuse have shaken me to my core. I have looked into the faces of victims, of their parents, and there is a void where joy should be. There is a vacuum where love should exist. And there is a disconnect with life and living. Victims live between worlds, the past encroaching on the currency of a beautiful life unfulfilled. It is a rape of the soul.
For the last three weeks, I have been immersed in round-the-clock meetings, hearing details no one should hear, referring victims to therapists, and compiling data on the perpetrators who share the same air we breathe. When the victim is one of ours and the molester is one of ours, the suffering is more acute. When it is a neighbor, a friend, a family member, a rebbe, etc., from our community who visits this abomination on our children, and the individual is not isolated or contained, it is a cancer that our society has permitted to metastasize, to grow and flourish into a malignancy.
Has child molestation risen to pandemic proportion in our midst? There is no formal actuarial data to support that, but no doubt predators have been sheltered, secure in the knowledge that the victim’s family will be so shrouded in shame and self-loathing, that denial will rule. When we have more compassion for the pedophile than for the victim, then our communities are doomed to self-destruction. “He’s respected….He’s choshuv….You can’t shame his family. You can’t Adeprive him of his livelihood…It will be a chilul Hashem….” By our own design, have we perpetuated the pain with our silence, reinforcing the shame, and being complicit in the trauma?
The medical literature says that a pedophile’s sexual interest in children is a disease that can not be controlled, and there must be appropriate psychological intervention. It will not go away with wishful thinking or haphazard monitoring.
Elected officials assign staffers to specific issues. There may be a “legislative desk,” a “Medicare desk,” an “Israel desk,” an “anti-Semitism desk,” a “discrimination desk,” etc, to respond to the needs of constituents. And after 26 years in office in the NYS Assembly, I now have a “sexual abuse desk.” No elected official should have a sexual abuse desk; no one should need one. But we do, because the experts say that one pedophile will abuse hundreds of victims, and I am now dealing with the exponential reality of decades and decades of our institutions, our communities, providing sanctuary to the perpetrators.
On my radio show, Miriam bravely recounted the violation of her son when he was eight years old at the hands of the principal of one of the largest institutions in Williamsburg. Repeatedly molested, her son, now in his twenties, is a member of a heavy metal band. The pain is etched on her son’s face. They have tried everything as a family to respectfully address the institution and remove the rebbe from access to children, and they have become mired in institutional politics, because the yeshiva refuses to acknowledge what the perpetrator did, though more than one victim has come forward. The politics of pain will rule no more; not on my watch. No pedophile should find sanctuary in our yeshivas. The perpetrators will get help or they will go to jail; there will be no self-serving wave of the hand, “Eh, the child and his parents are making it up.”
Another victim, Chaim, was molested summer after summer in one of our finest sleep-away camps. The psychic trauma has lingered for decades and shattered his life. He cannot trust. He cannot enjoy. He cannot feel. Unimaginable, unendurable, inescapable, - what sexual abuse does to the mind, the heart, the soul is devastatingly complete. It seizes the soul in a death-grip of terror and revulsion. It may be a passing scent….of grass, of trees…that triggers flashes of memories and overwhelms with painful sensory imagery of the abuse. It may be the feel of a fabric….it’s everywhere and nowhere…..and he remembers what it is like to be a child at the mercy of a vile adult who used his body over and over again…
For every one pedophile/molester there are hundreds of victims, as long as the violations go unreported or unaddressed. The victims can be your son, son-in-law, grandson, nephew…if it is not dealt with….I heard tapes of Chaim’s perpetrator…I couldn’t handle it. It was too much to bear. I couldn’t hear it anymore, how a molester tried to defend and rationalize what he did to his “favorites” in a well-renowned camp. “They didn’t know anything was going on. It wasn’t like they were hurt by what I did.” I. Didn’t. Want. To. Hear. One. More. Defiled. Utterance. Delving into the mind of a pedophile was traumatic. And his rapid-fire clipped speech and articulate manner underscored the banality of his malevolent indulgences. He destroyed this child and others, now adults, and he spoke of it as if it was meaningless to the children. “They were too young. They didn’t know what was going on. It’s nothing. It happened a long time ago.”
From this point forward, the message will be clear from every Rov and every community: Schools and parents have an obligation to come forward to deal with this. If they don’t, then they are complicit in the abuse and will have to answer to another higher desk, after 120 years. That desk, Hashem’s desk, knows the hearts of men, and the purity of conviction, and if you have shielded the guilty, that is the greatest chilul Hashem of all.
We are compiling information which will be presented to rabbonim, material which will be irrefutable, undeniable, inescapable, based upon which there will be a groundswell of support for victims, and an initiative to remove the perpetrators from any and all contact with children.
I can’t bear to hear one more story, but I will. I will hear hundreds if I have to. I’ll cry with as many victims as I have to. And my heart will break, and I will feel desperate to get away from the pain.…but I will get them help. I will listen and I will brush away more tears than I’ve seen in 26 years – my own….for another childhood lost. This will be eradicated from our midst…I’m not a crusader I’m a parent….a grandparent….a man whose mind can no longer process the horrific stories of violations…
If we don’t teach our children to protect themselves from molesters, the molesters will perversely teach them first and paralyze their lives and emotions…There is a part of me that is sorry that I started on this journey of misery and degradation, and there is a part of me which knows that someone has to speak for myriad victims. I haven’t slept well since I launched this mission. I don’t know if I will…again.
There are people who will say that this is a problem which has been around for decades and that it will be impossible to breach the walls that have been put up. But I have faith that with God’s help, we will be able to make a difference in many lives. Are we going to solve the problem entirely? Notoriously, pedophiles are likeable and they blend in well, and formulate a cover story for why they are so involved with your children. Finding every single one and rooting them out, is the province of God. But with God on our side, we have a chance to stanch the loss of our children.
It’s almost too much to bear, but then the phone rings again, and another victim who hasn’t told his narrative to anyone calls, and haltingly asks for a meeting…and I know I don’t have a choice. I’m at 718-853-9616…and I am waiting for your call
Article printed from Vos Iz Neias - (Yiddish:What’s News?): http://www.vosizneias.com
URL to article: http://www.vosizneias.com/19295/2008/08/13/brooklyn-ny-dov-hikind-dov-hikind-beyond-believe-heart-breaking-stories-i%e2%80%99ve-compiled-on-molestation-in-our-community-its-a-cancer-my-promise-i-won%e2%80%99t-sit-silent/
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86 comments:
We are honored that Y.Nussbaum has patronized us with his business. We noticed that even in the cold winter he came to avenue M and is carrying one of our very own shopping bags.
Money is still money, right?
Glatt Mart is one of my favorite places to shop for Shabbos. I was working in yeshiva of Brooklyn which is on Avenue L and Ocean pkwy.
So it's so convenient for me. I finished up with the boys in the resource room at YOB and drove my old car there in less than 5 minutes.
Oh: I'm not supposed to have a big mouth, but betzem hadavar I wasn't supposed to be working for yob after exposemolesters made a big bilbul, but shlomie had rachmunis and provided me the position if I agreed to lay low. I wasn't even listed as an employee. Shh.. don't say a word to anybody.
What's wrong if the Yated decided to give us some kovod and feature us in the gedolim photo-op this week together with Harav Hagoan Belsky giving a halacha class in camp Agudah?
I gradeh think we looked decent. Yankel looked okay. I'm trying to convince him to switch to an up-hat like me. I thought scratching my head and not wearing any glasses made me look like I was really shtyging away.
Not so fast Glatt Mart! As your new competitors we are hoping to squeeze your customers and make them ours. Where in flatbush can you find gourmet meat like ours? Don't forget dear customers that our New Square orange juice is cheaper than Glatt Marts too. If Nussbaum comes into our store we promise we'll put on him a requirement of a $500.00 minimum purchase or we kick him out. Money is still money. Even if it comes from the dirty hands of a child molester and abuser!
EM is back. B'H!
Anon,
Missed you too my dear friend!
Yes. We are here. We will continue to publish comments and threads sporadically. After the summer we'll be back to full speed. Just figured that I and my many dedicated helpers and secretaries deserve a summer break!
What happened to "Glatt Zone" on Avenue J? I heard they are closed down because of some shady kashrut? Can anyone verify?
This is the same establishment that was formerly called "The Kosher Spot" which was also forced to shut its doors because of selling non-glatt and treife fleish.
To Brooklyn Jew;
Call us about your kashrus concerns. We hope we can find some explanation that is both satisfying to you and us.
**********************************
Flatbush Community Kashrus Organization (KEHILAH), 1294 E. 8th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11210. (718) 951-0481; Fax: (718) 951-3983. Rabbi David Cohen, Rabbi Kenneth Auman, Rabbi Moshe Scheinerman, Rabbi Yisroel Reisman, Rabbi David Hollander, and Rabbi Yonoson Katz, Vaad Hapoel; Rabbi Zecharye Adler, Administrator.
· 1984 – As instructed by Rabbi Avigdor Miller, an Askan calls for a meeting which takes place at the home of Rabbi Yakov Perlow (the Novominsker) and is attended by Rabbi Avrohom Pam, Rabbi Elya Svei, Rabbi Chaim Dov Keller, Rabbi Aharon Schechter, Rabbi Moshe Scheinerman, Rabbi Shia Fishman and Rabbi Yankel Bender. At this meeting, chaired by Rabbi Perlow, the Askan discusses what is transpiring to innocent boys at the hands of Rabbi pedophiles and requests that Torah Umesorah and the Rabbonim issue a statement calling for their removal from Chinuch. Rabbi Svei informs this Askan that Torah Umesorah has consulted their attorneys who advised that for Torah Umesorah to admit knowledge of such abuse would subject Torah Umesorah, its staff, all its member schools and their staff to liability for not having reported their knowledge to the authorities earlier. Accordingly, Rabbi Elya Svei informs the Askan, neither he nor Torah Umesorah will do anything about this problem.
· 1984 thru 1985 – At directed by Rabbi Avrohom Pam an Askan approaches Rabbi Moshe Scheinerman and the two meet with Rabbi Shia (Joshua) Fishman in the office of Torah Umesorah. Both Scheinerman and Fishman neglect to inform this Askan that Fishman had been instructed by Torah Umesorah’s lawyer to do nothing about this issue. Rabbi Fishman requests the names of Kolko’s victims and promises absolute confidentiality. Names are provided to Rabbi Fishman who begins his own investigation of the allegations. He meets with and speaks with several victims who pour their hearts out to him after he guarantees them confidentiality. Rabbi Shia Fishman promptly discloses all he has learned to Rabbi Lipa Margulies who in turn publicly disparages and discredits each and every one of those boys who were brave enough to step forward.
· 1985 – A follow up meeting takes place at the home of Rabbi Simcha Kaufman and includes Rabbi Kaufman, Rabbi Lipa Margulies, Rabbi Shia Fishman, an Askan and an eyewitness. The eyewitness recounts his personal knowledge of Rabbi Kolko’s sexual abuse of boys and discusses the information he had gleaned from others. Rabbi Lipa Margulies insists that the charges are all fabrications and attacks the reputations of everyone involved in seeking the removal of Kolko from his Yeshiva Torah Temimah. Rabbi Shia Fishman subsequently informs anyone who asks that he can not deal with this issue as he is old (50 at the time) and will lose his job if he pursues this matter.
· 1985 – Rabbi Moshe Scheinerman is offered a lucrative and prestigious position as Rav of a Shul (a position he holds to this day) and is told that he must cease and desist from his actions against Yeshiva Torah Temimah Rabbeim (his own words) which he promptly does. Scheinerman abandons ship explaining that it is not appropriate for a rabbi of his stature to deal with these matters. Rabbi Yehoshua Leiman takes over.
Partial: Read its entirety at
www.rabbichildabuse.com
Here are the problems with Jewish education, according to Rabbi Manuel Gold, a plenary presenter at the CAJE conference.
(First, a little biographical info: Gold grew up Orthodox and graduated from Yeshiva University. But he later received Conservative rabbinical ordination and then worked as a high-level educational official in the Reform movement.)
Congregational presidents: often don’t know how to do their jobs, are not in adequate contact with congregants or professionals working in their congregational schools.
Rabbis: often view themselves only as teachers’ supervisors and often pull rank on their educators when a congregant has a problem with the Hebrew school.
Parents: often don’t have a good idea about what is bothering their children about Hebrew school.
Schools: “We believe that if a school is going to be really successful it has to take on the best of secular education,” Gold said. But Judaism doesn’t lend itself to tests, attendance requirements, report cards and homework. While certain skills, such as Hebrew, might need to be taught by standard pedagogical methods, Judaism, he said, needs to be taught through experience. “What are the SATs in Judaism?” he asked. “There is no equivalent.”
The kids: not the problem. “The most difficult kids in your schools are going to become the teachers and the religious school directors and congregational presidents,” he said. “We have to be careful not to fail our kids because we don’t want them to fail in Judaism. We have to be able to deal with them as individuals and not kick out the problem children.”
Bar mitzvah: For many parents, Hebrew school is only a vehicle to get a kid through the bar/bat mitzvah ceremony and is dropped as soon as the ceremony is over. Parents often only are concerned about the bar/bat mitzvah because they don’t want their kid to be embarrassed at the ceremony. Kids pick up on this, Gold says.
“They know their parents are concerned as soon as they ask the question, ‘How are you doing in your bar mitzvah studies?’” he said. When the kids answer that they are not doing well, the parents become even more nervous and often make the following deal with their kids: “If you do well, you don’t have to continue with Hebrew school after the bar mitzvah.”
Teachers: need to validate their students. Remember, says Gold: “There is no wrong answer, every answer is on the road to being right.”
Content: How do we teach kids that they can view Jewish content in different ways and see the different possibilities that exist?. If you don’t understand the text, read through it again and contemplate it. Learn how to deal with the substance of the matter, he said.
In the Q & A period after Gold stopped speaking, one teacher asked Gold what he thinks teachers should do about the biggest problem with Hebrew schools: the kids. They don’t care, they don’t attend school, they misbehave and they send text messages on their cell phones during class, the teacher said.
Gold’s answer? Whatever you do, don’t kick them out of class. Make them stay.
(The Fundermentalist wonders whether it’s wise to tell teachers that the worst punishment they can levy is making their students sit through their classes.)
Dale and Zalman Silber were released without bail Tuesday after separate arraignments before Judge Catherine Bartlett in Rockland County Court in New City.
Silber, 41, had already posted $10,000 bail in Manhattan after he was accused last month of misdemeanor charges of sex abuse and a felony charge of practicing a profession without a license. The charges stemmed from accusations that Silber examined several women while posing as a gynecologist.
In the Rockland indictment, Silber and Dale were accused of 34 charges, including the felony of performing medical examinations without a license between 2005 and 2006. They also were accused of four counts of fourth-degree aggravated sex abuse, a felony, and 24 counts of third-degree sex abuse, a misdemeanor. All the charges related to the alleged contact with the Monsey woman.
http://www.lohud.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008808140428
Salomon, Rabbi Mattisyahu
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Avi Shafran running his big mouth again. If only he would equate this to child molestation.
http://web.israelinsider.com/Views/12991.htm
"A vicious, murderous attack on innocents, however, is an example not of something gone horribly wrong but of someone horribly evil. And to portray it as some disembodied event without a conscious cause is to rub salt into the emotional wounds of every human being who may ever have shed a tear over Daniel and Einat Haran's too-short lives and terrible deaths."
I was shocked with disbelief that the Jewish Press actually had the Dov Hikind article this week.
This is the same paper that NOT ONCE mentioned Kolko by name (even after he plead guilty). I'm assuming that this is one reason they published "Beyond belief" because NO NAMES were mentioned.
Another possible explanation is JP jumping on the bandwagon (better late then never) of a politician who has much clout, and trying to "look good" in the eyes of Dov and his supporters.
I guarantee you that had UOJ written the exact same article the JP would not have published it.
Additionally, I doubt that the article would have been published if kolko's (or any other child molester) name would have been in there.
The Jewish press was wrong for giving publicity to this issue. This is a chilul hashem. So what if no names were mentioned, yidden will now be thought of as child molesters and the goiyim are going to laugh and degrade us.
Why must my name always be dragged into this? I only plead guilty to RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT. That does not make me a child molester!
I too question the motives of the Jewish Fress (and Hikind). I too am stunned by the publishing.
That being said, I do give the JF kudos for doing it. It was an impressive piece written with genius articulation and sincerity by a politician who showed he is also a concerned citizen.
Yes, no names were spelled out. Yes, Hikind woke up late. Yes, the JF sputters and hesitates in ruffling some feathers because they are scared it may rub some people the wrong way.
However, for one once they took a positive step forward in tackling the child sexual abuse issue in the Jewish community. Ulterior motives or not - they managed to scramble out of a checkmate. At least for the time being!
At least I have an ally in YWN. I've been saying for months now that blogmeisters fabricated all this nonsense about the Rubashkins.
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Rabbi Avi Shafran: Judge-And-Jury Journalism
August 15, 2008
Like an amusement park barker inviting passers-by to step right up and throw balls at some unfortunate’s head sticking through a hole, The New York Times editorial page seems to have been calling on any and all to pitch print projectiles at a mark of its own: the kosher-meat producer Agriprocessors.
An editorial in that newspaper on August 1 was entitled “’The Jungle’ Again” – a reference, of course, to Upton Sinclair’s famous novel depicting the horrors of the meatpacking industry in early 20th century Chicago. That book depicts a world of unsanitary, cruel and unsafe conditions, with human fingers mixed into ground meat, gross mistreatment of workers, corruption, venality and filth. Having set the tone with its title, The Times’ editorial begins by referring to “a slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa” with “an ugly reputation for abusing animals and workers,” and goes on to cite “reports of dirty, dangerous conditions” there.
While the editorial’s thrust was aimed at the government’s treatment of illegal immigrants arrested at the facility, the imagery of the “kosher meatpacking plant” [emphasis – or at least the italics – mine] and the “abusive practices” of which “once-silent workers now tell” was firmly embedded in minds’ eyes before they likely glazed over as the editorial went on with a predictable lambasting of the government for enforcing immigration laws.
A cynic, or perhaps just a savvy observer, might note that many of the alleged abuses have been denied and none confirmed, and that federal inspectors were a constant presence at the plant.
He might further note the involvement of an activist labor union in the Agriprocessors controversy. And further still, that a possible reason why “once-silent” workers only began telling tales of mistreatment after their arrests and facing deportation may have to do with something called a “U visa” – a special permit to remain in the United States available to noncitizens who have been abused by employers and might be helpful to a prosecution of that crime.
One didn’t have to be either cynical or savvy, though, to have been unimpressed by a letter to the editor of the same paper several days earlier from Ingrid Newkirk, the president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, in which she draws a parallel between “routine animal abuse” at Agriprocessors (that would be a post-slaughter practice that was discontinued after objections to it were raised) and the “human suffering” of the company’s employees. “It should come as no surprise.” she wrote, “that a facility that profits from tormenting and killing animals would also oppress and abuse humans.”
One wonders what the PETA president might make of the principled vegetarianism of human abusers like Charles Manson, Pol Pot and Adolph Hitler, ym”sh. One needn’t even wonder, unfortunately, about her reaction to a recent murder, the stabbing to death, dismemberment and cannibalism of an innocent passenger on a bus near Manitoba, Canada. Ms. Newkirk attempted to place an ad in a local newspaper describing how “his cries are ignored… the man with the knife shows no emotion… the victim is slaughtered… and his flesh is eaten” – before informing readers that the description was – surprise! – of an animal in a slaughterhouse. The paper chose to reject the ad, perhaps seeing it as abusive in its own way. She should have tried The Times.
But the crowning outrage came on August 6, in a superficially high-minded but innately ugly op-ed piece deemed fit to print by The Times. Written by the rabbi of an Orthodox congregation in Washington, D.C., the piece’s “hook” was the imminence of Tisha B’Av, and the preceding eight days when observant Jews eschew meat. Therefrom, the writer – following The Times’ and Ms. Newkirk’s lead and taking accusations as facts – decries the “abusive practices” at Agriprocessors (described, he explains, in “government documents” – i.e. affidavits of illegal immigrant workers’ claims).
Although he takes the necessary pains to avoid a libel lawsuit, throwing in the requisite qualifiers, the rabbi marches proudly in step with the editorial page’s drumbeat, nobly slapping his fist against the collective Jewish breast in penance for the unproven sins of others.
I do not know if Agriprocessors knowingly hired illegal aliens, or mistreated workers or was a front for a drug operation, as statements in the “government documents” allege. But neither do The New York Times, PETA or the rabbi. And so, until the facts are known, none of us has any moral right to act as if we know what we cannot.
Which is why some readers, like this one, felt that the rabbi’s Tisha B’Av hook was indeed most appropriate for his op-ed. Although not quite in the way the rabbi intended.
For Tisha B’Av, of course, according to our mesorah, has its roots in the failure of character of those b’nai Yisroel in the midbar who, the Torah tells, spoke ill of Eretz Yisroel, the land promised them by Hashem.
“If speaking ill of trees and stones is [so sinful],” comments the Gemara (Arachin 15a), “all the more so is speaking ill of one’s fellow.” And so Tisha B’Av is a mournful moment in Jewish time because of the grave sin of slander.
© 2008 AM ECHAD RESOURCES
[Rabbi Shafran is director of public affairs for Agudath Israel of America.]
Where was Dov Hikind until now? I don't think he can be trusted. I don't think he made it clear enough that the police should be notified. It sounds to me more like he still would trust a Rabbinical investigation. I would not trust the man.
DH offered 10 grand to find the creep who sexually assaulted a girl in Boro Park a few weeks ago. Indications are it was a gentile who was the offender, not a Jewish individual. Which begs the question.
Is this what it takes to light the fire that this politician has ignited? Where was DH's head buried all this time? Not a word on Kolko, nothing said about Efrayim Shapiro/Yisroel Shapiro and the long list of Baltimore child molesters. silence on Bobov and Yeshiva of Brooklyn, and Ger, and Satmar, and Tendler(s), and Mondrowitz, and Colmer, and Friedlander, and Brauner, and Brenner, and...
www.baltimoresun.com/news/world/bal-te.ethiopia17aug17,0,5998397.story
Israel declares end to Ethiopian immigration
Thousands of Africans still declare links of ethnicity, backed by U.S. activist groups
Associated Press
August 17, 2008
GONDAR, Ethiopia
Click here to find out more!
Sitting in a leaky, flyblown hut, a few dozen Ethiopian villagers are anxiously waiting to be transported to another world.
They have just been given word that their years of waiting are over and they soon will make a 2,000-mile journey by land and air with what is probably the last wave of Ethiopian immigrants to Israel.
In doing so, they are flying into the teeth of a dilemma that touches the heart of Israel's founding philosophy.
For people like 48-year-old Abe Damamo, his wife and eight children, wrenching change awaits.
Like most Ethiopians with Jewish roots, they have come from the Gondar region of northern Ethiopia. Their remote village uses donkeys for transportation and has no bathrooms. Damamo has no formal education and speaks no language but his own.
He is moving to an industrialized democracy where he will have to learn Hebrew, master a cell phone, commute to work and find his place in a nation of immigrants from dozens of countries.
But to him, being Jewish is all that matters.
"I am so happy to go and live my religion," he says through a translator.
Not everyone at the Israeli end is happy, however. In the initial stages of an immigration that began three decades ago, all the Ethiopians emigrating to Israel were recognized outright as Jews. But those now seeking to make the trip are the so-called Falash Mura, whose ancestors converted to Christianity, the main Ethiopian faith, at the end of the 19th century to escape discrimination.
Initially, Israel balked at accepting their claim of Jewishness, but relented after American Jews led a campaign for the Falash Mura.
About 40,000 moved to Israel, a country of 7 million, joining 80,000 already there. Their presence touched off a fierce debate in Israel over where to draw the line.
Ethiopians with any hope, however faint, of eligibility for Israeli citizenship have descended on camps in the city of Gondar, scrambling to prove their Jewishness. Men in prayer shawls attend makeshift synagogues, and children in skullcaps sit on mud floors learning the Hebrew alphabet and Jewish holidays.
Centuries of intermarriage and a lack of documentation have made it extremely difficult to prove who is a Jew, and the group awaiting their flight to Israel last month was supposed to be among the last. The Israeli government has decided that the influx must stop.
Those able to meet the criteria for immigration will have to undergo conversion to Orthodox Judaism after arriving in Israel.
Besides cutting to the heart of the age-old debate over who is a Jew, the dispute between the Israeli government and the U.S. Jewish activists who finance the Gondar camps raises uncomfortable questions about a central tenet of Israel's founding philosophy.
Israel's Law of Return guarantees citizenship for any Jew in need, and these days the country is especially concerned about boosting its Jewish population to compete with the Arabs. But the Ethiopians have proved the hardest immigrant group to absorb, and the Falash Mura, some critics feel, are pushing the limits.
Like every other immigrant group, Ethiopian-Israelis have made their mark on the human mosaic of Jewish nationhood - giving it top-notch soldiers, funky musicians, world-class athletes and two members of parliament. They also have a powerful backer, the ultra-Orthodox Shas party in the ruling coalition, which capitalizes on the Ethiopian vote.
But as a whole they are poor, plagued by crime, violence and substance abuse, feeling shut out of a world very different from rural Africa.
The steep learning curve is evident even before they depart for Israel.
Those approved for immigration are taught what a refrigerator looks like, how to cook on a stovetop, how to flush a toilet. Nurses teach the women to use female hygiene products. The families are introduced to TVs and are shown videos of life in their new world. They are warned to mind the "magic stairs" - the escalators - at the Addis Ababa airport.
Before leaving, they undergo extensive medical checkups at an Israeli Embassy compound in Addis Ababa, and their African surnames are replaced with Hebrew ones.
But despite all the preparations, most Ethiopian immigrants over age 35 go straight onto welfare after reaching Israel, according to the Jewish Agency.
The Israeli government, lacking a universally accepted definition of Jewishness, has long welcomed immigrants whose links to Judaism were tenuous, many of them among the hundreds of thousands who came from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.
Israel has struggled for years to figure out which Ethiopians should be admitted. Each time it has tried to end the immigration by emptying the Gondar camps and airlifting their inhabitants to Israel, thousands more have flooded into the camps, scrambling to prove their Jewishness.
The argument now seems to have come down to numbers: Israel says the last of the Falasha Mura who qualify for immigration arrived in Israel this month; the American groups say 8,700 have been left behind.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has upheld the Israeli list.
Now we know why Shafran has no comment regarding yudi kolko and Jewish child molesters. Read his statements.
---------------------------------
"For Tisha B’Av, according to Jewish tradition, has its roots in the failure of character of those Jews in the Sinai desert who, the Torah tells, spoke ill of the land promised them by G-d.
“If speaking ill of trees and stones is [so sinful],” comments the Talmud (Arachin 15a), “all the more so is speaking ill of one’s fellow.” And so Tisha B’Av is a mournful moment in Jewish time because of the grave sin of slander. "
"I don't think he made it clear enough that the police should be notified."
===============================
I hope Dov Hikind is cognizant of this. He should urge anyone who seeks his help TO GO DIRECTLY TO THE POLICE. Furthermore, he should intervene and share the information he receives with law enforcement too.
If he is apprehensive and favors the Rabbinical investigation route as the first step, he will be no different than any other enabler.
I hope that is not the case!
http://theunorthodoxjew.blogspot.com/2008/08/beyond-belief-heart-breaking-stories.html
Anonymous said...
# Library Lover Says:
comments - arrow Right here in Ir Hakodesh, initial M, we have a molester in a major yeshiva, he has been there for yrs, a Rebbe..he was involved in a camp and everyone knew him as a molester..yet he is still here, still in the largest school, still teaching first grade..WHY???Dov, HELP!
08-04-2008 - 4:41 PM
I'm looking for the person who posted this comment on VIN a while back. You obviously know about this "Rebbe". We are seeking other victims of Abramson . PLEASE call Dov Hikinds office with any info that you have. Talk to Eli. His # is 718-853-9616. If there is anyone else out there who has any info on this animal please call as well. Tizku L'mitzvot.
http://thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c37_a13200/News/National.html
BREAKING NEWS: Photo Scandal Involving Yeshiva Hoops Coach Widens; More Victims Sought
by Staff Report
Asserting that there are more victims of an alleged sexual abuser than the four teens who have come forward to the police, the rabbi of an Orthodox synagogue in Teaneck, N.J., is calling on congregants to help an investigation in the case of Adam Melzer, 34, who was arrested several weeks ago for child endangerment.
Melzer, a married parent and member of the Orthodox community in Teaneck, coached basketball teams at several Jewish day schools in New Jersey and New York. He is accused of persuading teenage boys that he coached to take naked pictures of themselves and give them to him.
Four youngsters in the community, who are now between the ages of 16 and 18, contacted the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office and the Teaneck Police Department, leading to an investigation of Melzer, and to his arrest.
He was charged with four counts on endangering the welfare of a child, and turned himself in to authorities on July 18.
In an announcement during services last Shabbat morning at Congregation Rinat Yisrael, Rabbi Yosef Adler said that additional youngsters are believed to have been victims. He urged parents to speak to their children and, if they have information, to come forward to the authorities.
The rabbi, who is also rosh yeshiva of the Torah Academy of Bergen County (TABC), a boys' high school, said that the more youngsters who come forward, the greater their collective credibility would be in the event of a trial.
Rabbi Adler told The Jewish Week on Tuesday that he and his rabbinic colleagues at the Rabbinical Council of Bergen County had discussed the case, but that as far as he knew, he was the only rabbi to date to speak out and encourage cooperation with the police.
The four youngsters reportedly said that during 2006 and 2007, Melzer told each of them that someone was blackmailing them and had nude pictures of them. He allegedly told them he would intercede with the blackmailers and needed nude pictures of them.
A police spokesman familiar with the case said that adults whose social life focuses heavily on young teenagers should be viewed with a sense of caution.
Parents at the Rosenbaum Yeshiva of North Jersey, in River Edge, where the four teens were students and where Melzer had been a basketball coach, received a letter from the dean and president of the school soon after the arrest. It stated that during the time Melzer coached there, "we received no reports of improper behavior or anything that would have raised even the slightest concern."
The letter asserted that the school has "a zero tolerance" policy regarding the endangerment of children and urged parents with direct knowledge to contact the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office, which has established a hotline at (201) 226-5155..
Background checks? Fuggedaboutit! We are against such silly laws.
---
According to Gloria Montealegre, spokesperson for Gov. Jon Corzine, a New Jersey law passed in 1986 mandates "criminal history record checks for final candidates for school employee positions." While the law was amended in 2006 to authorize local school districts to require volunteers to undergo the background checks, "there is no statewide requirement that volunteers undergo the checks," said Montealegre.
She added that the law applies to public schools only, since "we do not have jurisdiction over private schools. They make their own decisions."
Charged with four counts of child endangerment, Melzer turned himself in to county authorities in Paramus last Friday. Held on $50,000 bail, he was scheduled to be arraigned in municipal court on Tuesday.
http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Jailed-Computer-expert-at-centre.4401339.jp
Published Date: 18 August 2008
By ALLAN MACKIE
THE "librarian" for a worldwide internet child abuse ring was today jailed indefinitely.
Paedophile Philip Thompson, 27, was one of the kingpins behind the internet-based child abuse ring that reached 33 countries, including the UK, the US, Australia and Canada, Teesside Crown Court heard.
Thompson admitted 27 charges today, including
16 counts of making indecent photographs of children, seven of distributing indecent photographs of children and one count of causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity.
Judge Michael Taylor said Thompson posed a very "significant risk" to the public and therefore he would be imposing an indeterminate prison sentence for public protection.
He told him: "You have shown that you are a very dangerous individual indeed. I consider that you pose a very significant risk to the public and you are a dangerous offender."
Thompson was told he would have to serve a minimum jail term of three years and nine months and would be placed on the sex offenders register for life and banned from the internet and any contact with children.
The unemployed loner lived a quiet life with his mother in Gooseport Road, Stockton-on-Tees, using his benefits to collect films and memorabilia.
However, unknown to the outside world, the self-taught computer expert used his skills to moderate an invitation-only website featuring borderline images of children.
The gateway website served two purposes – to show the users had a perverted interest in children and to show their commitment.
Once they had signed up, members would link up – often using instant messaging programmes – to use more secretive online environments.
It was here that thousands of sick images and videos, as well as information about vulnerable children, were exchanged.
Thompson, who told police he was the "librarian" for the site, was caught with a massive archive of nearly 250,000 perverted images on his computer, of which more than 3,000 were of levels four and five – the worst kind of child abuse images.
Thompson was unmasked when child abuse officers from Scotland Yard began investigating the site he ran and their inquiries led to him.
The police have so far identified 360 suspects worldwide, of which 130 were in the UK. To date 50 arrests have been made in Britain, including a police community support officer and a lecturer.
It emerged after sentencing that 15 British children have been saved from the clutches of paedophiles after Thompson was unmasked and his online activities stopped.
The international network was infiltrated by law enforcement officers and dozens of suspects arrested.
The investigation involved the largest deployment yet of undercover officers in the UK for a child protection inquiry.
Detective Sergeant Becky Driscoll, of Cleveland Police, said Thompson thought he was operating "below the radar".
"He was integral. He played a key role. He was trusted by others members of this site, so much so that he stored horrific images of child abuse on their behalf," she said.
"He described the 250,000 child abuse images as his collection. He was prepared to share that with acquaintances he found on his forum.
"This site would have existed without him, but it would not have been operating as effectively."
Detective Chief Superintendent Mark Braithwaite, the force's head of crime, said: "Thompson was a critical piece of this network.
"He was, essentially, the librarian for a myriad of images that were distributed to like-minded individuals both in this country and elsewhere.
"This was an extremely sensitive and highly complex investigation, requiring excellent teamwork between Cleveland Police, the Child Exploitation Online Protection (Ceop) Centre and the Metropolitan Police Service along with other police forces in the UK.
"I hope this result acts as a deterrent and sends out a clear warning that activity such as this will not be tolerated."
Jim Gamble, chief executive of the Ceop, added: "This website, whilst appearing to operate on the margins of legality, was clearly a front for the sinister, sexual abuse of children and an image trading ground for paedophiles.
"There is a simple message for those individuals like Thompson, who think they can go to this website – or indeed any space on the internet – and discuss their sexual interest in children and share images.
"You leave a digital footprint. We will track you down and hold you to account."
Prosecutor Harry Hadfield told the court police raided Thompson's home in February this year and recovered two desktop "tower" computers and a laptop – recovering nearly one million photographs and films.
"Forensic analysis by computer experts established that the defendant had 241,000 indecent photographs of children, being one of the largest seizures of indecent photographs in the UK," he said.
Thompson was the moderator for an online forum used by paedophiles across the world to trade in child pornography, the court heard.
Mr Hadfield told the court: "The defendant's role was to police the website, which gave him the opportunity to transfer these images to his computer.
"The evidence recovered from his computer showed he had amassed a vast collection of indecent photographs of children.
"It appeared the defendant kept some of the most serious images to use as trading chips."
During police interviews, Thompson admitted sharing the pornographic images with other like-minded people across the world and he told police how he had also set up his own two online forums.
The court also heard that the goatee-bearded defendant cooperated fully with police and provided details of other people involved in his network.
"The Crown would say that this collection of indecent photographs and the subsequent police investigation revealed that this defendant has been involved in the distribution of these photographs for the last four or five years," Mr Hadfield said.
Thompson admitted a total of 27 charges today.
These were: 16 counts of making indecent photographs of children; seven counts of distributing indecent photographs of children; two counts of taking indecent photographs of children; one count of possessing child abuse images; and one count of causing or inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity.
Be very careful about trusting Dov Hikind. Yes he may mean well, but bottom line is he's a politician.
Why not go directly to the police with any allegations of inappropriate behavior and abuse?
What purpose is being fulfilled by first going to this assemblyman?
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3584518,00.html
Principal arrested on molestation charges
Principal of West Bank school arrested on suspicion of having inappropriately touched dozens of teenage male students. Suspect denies all charges
Efrat Weiss
Published: 08.19.08, 08:33 / Israel News
A school principal in a West Bank settlement has been arrested on charges of indecent assault against dozens of his students, aged 12-14, Ynet has learned.
Married and in his late 40s, the man was brought before the Kfar Saba Magistrates' Court on Monday, where he was remanded for three additional days.
According to the police, the suspect repeatedly denied all the allegations in his interrogation: "There was nothing of the sort, I'm being framed," he said.
The investigation began following a tip-off regarding acts the suspect allegedly forced upon eight of his students. A covert investigation was immediately launched, but began to build up speed after an official complaint was filed last week by a resident of the settlement where the incidents allegedly took place – a psychologist who said she was contacted by a family claiming the school principal molested their son.
Chief-Superintendent Mark Amiel told Ynet that investigators sought the testimonies of two youths following the complaint. Amiel said that since the boys were both under the age of 14, their questioning was conducted by specially trained officers and welfare officials.
One of the youths testified that the suspect would sit him on his lap and touch his genitals. The boy recalled at least 15 such incidents spanning nearly two-year. Another student reported the same pattern of abuse.
"This is a difficult and complex investigation," noted Amiel, adding that most of the incidents appear to have taken place within school walls. "We know of another incident that occurred a month ago, while the students were away on a field trip," he said.
"The suspect took advantage of his position and the innocence of dozens of children, employing the same methods to molest them."
Amiel said that some of the parents asked to consult with the settlement's rabbi before cooperating with the investigation. The rabbi, on his part, has cooperated with investigators in full and has been deposed.
"This investigation has just begun. Over the next few days the picture will get a lot clearer. These are shocking incidents, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. We estimate it won't be long before we accumulate enough material to build a case for an an indictment."
One of the more unusual white-collar crime cases unveiled this year has many at a synagogue in Norfolk, Va. shaking their heads.
Until this week, Joseph Shereshevsky, a member of the B’nai Israel Congregation, was known throughout the Orthodox Jewish community for his investment prowess and his philanthropy. Now Mr. Shereshevsky and his business partner, Steven Byers, stand accused of running a Ponzi scheme through their investment firm, WexTrust Capital.
Members of the B’Nai Israel Congregation often asked Rabbi Chaim Silver about Mr. Shereshevsky’s trustworthiness, he told The Wall Street Journal. He reassured them that he was “the kindest, most generous, trustworthy man.”
That’s not how federal prosecutors see him or Mr. Byers, however. According to The Journal, they say that WexTrust is one of the biggest “affinity” investment cases they have ever prosecuted. In these cases, firms raise money from people with similar backgrounds. Nearly 1,200 investors flocked to WexTrust, as word spread from Virginia to Chicago to the diamond dealers of Manhattan to Israel and South Africa.
Much of the money came through Mr. Shereshevsky’s deep ties to the Orthodox Jewish community, prosecutors say.
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/08/15/behind-a-financial-scandal-deep-ties-to-orthodox-jews/
August 20, 2008
Brooklyn Boy, 5, Falls 10 Stories to His Death After Public Housing Elevator Stalls
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
A 5-year-old Brooklyn boy fell 10 stories down an elevator shaft to his death on Tuesday in a public housing complex where residents had complained of recurring problems with the elevators and renovations had been delayed because of federal cutbacks.
The police said the boy, Jacob Neuman, 5, was in an elevator with his 8-year-old brother at 70 Clymer Street in South Williamsburg just before 9:00 a.m. when the elevator became lodged between the 10th and 11th floors. Jacob, a student at a Talmudic academy, was on his way to classes when he tried to escape through the opened elevator door by jumping to the 10th floor, the police said, but lost his footing and fell to the bottom of the shaft.
The boy was taken to Brooklyn Hospital Center, where he was pronounced dead at 9:30 a.m., said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office.
Jacob was the youngest of five children, three girls and two boys. The family lives on the 11th floor of the building, which is part of the Taylor-Wythe apartment complex, owned and overseen by the New York City Housing Authority.
The funeral, held nearby at the Yereim Orthodox Chapel at 93 Broadway soon afterward, was attended by several hundred men, dressed in the traditional black garb of the Hasidic community, and by women with head coverings. Jacob’s father, Chaim, delivered a eulogy, saying in Yiddish, “We are parting, but we will never forget you.”
Jacob’s mother and sisters clutched their faces in grief and had to be helped into chairs on the sidewalk near the end of the service.
In interviews at the complex, residents of the 12-story building said there had been repeated problems with the elevators.
“A lot of times they have become stuck,” said Doris Acosta, who lives on the second floor. “Sometimes they don’t close or don’t open,” she said. “Like when we try to close the door it stays open, and sometimes when we are trying to press the elevator button it doesn’t move. It has happened a lot of times.”
Akive Mendelowitz, 56, who has lived on the 11th floor of the building for 21 years, said he had often called 311 for help.
“This morning — it was like I would say 5:30 — I wanted to go down, and the elevator did not stop,” he said in a telephone interview. Instead, he had to walk down a few floors to catch the elevator. “I needed to go to the 10th floor and then 9th floor,” he said.
“And then this happens,” he said.
The building’s elevators were rated “unsatisfactory” in 17 of 21 inspections the housing authority conducted from 2004 through 2007, city records show, but authority officials said most of those involved minor matters like broken light bulbs or oil leaking from the elevator motor. The authority did not find any problems it considered hazardous, said Howard Marder, an authority spokesman.
The building’s two elevators were to have been modernized in 2004, but those projects were twice delayed because of cuts in federal aid, housing authority officials said.
According to City Department of Buildings records, someone complained on Jan. 21 this year that one of the building’s elevators became stuck for about an hour.
A housing authority official said five operational failures were reported in the last six months in the elevator where Jacob fell. According to the buildings department Web site, the last recorded inspection of the elevators at that address was on Oct. 3, 2007.
A housing authority statement said that the circumstances were under review by city agencies.
David Yassky, the city councilman who represents the neighborhood, said in a statement that the housing authority assured him that it was “working to get to the bottom” of Jacob’s death. The Police Department was also investigating.
Mr. Yassky said in a telephone interview that he had not been aware of elevator problems at the building but he was aware of general complaints at the complex, which was completed in 1974. “Public housing and the city housing authority has been chronically underfunded for years, and the result of that neglect is just becoming more and more evident,” he said. “There are elevators that don’t work and doors that are chronically broken. This is what happens when you let buildings fall apart through neglect.”
“This is a tragedy and a very personal thing that happened today,” he said.
Israel Rosenberg, 30, the president of the tenants’ association at the complex, said he had received complaints from residents two weeks ago about the elevator from which Jacob fell. “They’re a danger,” he said. “They’ve been a danger. We complain but nothing is ever done.”
So common is the sound of the emergency alarm at 70 Clymer Street that when Tanya Johnson, a resident, heard it on Tuesday, she assumed that it was just another person stuck. It was not until later while watching the news that she knew it concerned a graver emergency.
“I heard the cries, I heard the hollers,” she said. “I heard him calling his brother’s name. I heard the little boy. He was hysterical. I heard them pushing the button.”
Pessie Gelb, 37, a neighbor, said she saw Jacob’s brother after the accident. “He was saying, ‘I couldn’t grab my brother. I couldn’t grab my brother,’ ” she recalled.
Jacob was a student at the Central United Talmudic Academy. The president of the United Jewish Organization, Rabbi David Niederman, said some of Jacob’s siblings came home from summer camp upstate when they learned of his death.
At the funeral, Rabbi Mendel Teitelbaum wept as he spoke. “This is not the nature of the world,” the rabbi said, “that young children should die before their parents and grandparents.”
The tiny coffin, draped in a black cloth with white trim, was carried down Broadway and placed in a minivan to be taken to a cemetery in New Brunswick, N.J.
Reporting was contributed by Al Baker, David Giambusso, Daryl Khan and Ray Rivera.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20fall.html?ref=nyregion
“Today’s kosher supermarket is looking to provide everything the community needs under one roof, from the butcher, to organic produce, even flowers for Shabbat,” Mr. Lubinsky said. “Customers want the convenience of one-stop shopping, in an aesthetically pleasing atmosphere, and they want a large selection of high-quality food items.”
Moreover, shoppers at Pomegranate don’t have to look for kosher symbols. “They know everything within arm’s reach is kosher, and they appreciate that,” Mr. Lubinsky said.
On Avenue J, Orthodox Midwood’s main street, the anticipation was palpable.
“I’m very excited,” said Mark Charmas, 40, who owns a local women’s apparel store. “It’s going to have a lot of cool stuff.”
In addition to its size (Pomegranate is the largest all-kosher market in the city, Mr. Gold said), the capacious parking lot with valet parking is attractive to shoppers with large families.
“Orthodox families are larger on average than secular families, and spend twice as much on groceries, about $15,000 a year,” Mr. Lubinsky said,.
Tamara Nakolic, a painter who lives nearby, is eager to check out Pomegranate. She likes kosher markets. “They are more careful about what type of food is provided, especially the meat, and the vegetables, and the dairy,” she said. “There are no chemicals. The prices are higher, but not so much higher.”
Prices will be a concern. Because of the way the store looks, some neighbors are worried that it will be more expensive than, say, Moisha’s Discount Supermarket down the street. But Mr. Gold said prices would be competitive, given the quality of the fresh food and takeout dishes.
The takeout menu will include predictable items like barbecue chicken and coleslaw as well as unusual fare including sushi, burekas and salmon roulade with sun-dried tomatoes, said Aviv Mosovich, the chef of the meat kitchen. (Pomegranate also has a dairy kitchen.)
As for nonperishables, prices may be lower because of the purchasing power of big stores, said Rabbi Menachem Genack, chief executive of the Orthodox Union, which certifies kosher products.
So how will that affect shops like Moisha’s Discount? “There’s going to be a shake-up,” Rabbi Genack said. “The little stores are hurting as more and more people opt for the convenience of one-stop shopping and better prices they can get in large-scale stores,” he said, “and it’s only going to get worse.”
Amy Sara Clark contributed reporting.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2008/08/19/2008-08-19_child_molester_strikes_twice_in_borough_-2.html
Child molester strikes twice in Borough Park, Brooklyn
By Ethan Rouen
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Tuesday, August 19th 2008, 11:16 PM
Police are hunting for a child rapist who grabbed two girls - one just 4 years old - off Brooklyn streets and attacked them, cops said Tuesday.
The first rape occurred July 16 in Borough Park, when the pervert saw the 4-year-old on her stoop, pulled her into his car and drove off. He sexually assaulted the child, then released her nearby, police said.
On Aug. 3, the rapist dragged a 14-year-old girl into his car as she walked in the area of 12th Ave. and 41st St. in Borough Park about 11 p.m. She was also raped and released nearby.
The attacker was described as white, about 20 to 25, with a thin build and short, black spiked hair. He was wearing a black T-shirt and white sneakers.
He drove a dark four-door sedan with tinted windows and a beige cloth interior, police said.
Anyone with information about his whereabouts is urged to call (800) 577-TIPS.
by annie
This is not a complete list. I've begun adding characteristics and red flags that I can think of that I watch for in protecting my grandchildren. Please send us any that you are aware of. Most of these will be relating to men, or the male gender, but please be aware that women also abuse children. Please keep in mind, too, that having some of these traits does not mean the person is a molester.
Remember, you can't pick an abuser out of a crowd. There are no social or economic barriers. An abuser can be the president of a company, your brother, friend, father, grandfather, uncle, neighbor, teacher, babysitter, delivery person, straight, gay, married, single, male or female, adolescent to elderly, rich or poor, can be in a position of power or some nameless homeless person in your community.
Abusers may:
* Have been abused as children themselves
* Be Sexually attracted to children (most can't or won't resist these urges)
* Find positions where children are available (leader of children's clubs, ministries, etc., coaches, camp counselors & chaperones, daycare centers, school positions, offers to babysit for friends & family, etc.)
* Seem to love children, children seem drawn to person
* Seek out women with children (or friends with children)
* Spend a lot of time with a child (not their own)
* Seem rigid, moral, a pillar of the community (too often accusations of abuse have not been believed because the person seemed to be too good, too outstanding to do such a thing
* Groom a child--create a special bond (this may involve giving child gifts, money, or even alcohol, or other 'forbidden' things that make it appear he is a special friend and creates atmosphere for secret keeping. Could also include playfully touching, tickling, etc., but moves toward inappropriate touch)
* Be an authoritarian or timid and unassertive
* Frequent places like video arcades
* Be addicted to child pornography
* Be uncomfortable in adult relationships (i.e., doesn't relate well, insecure)
* Have symptoms and after-effects of a survivor
* Deny or rationalize their behavior
* Be Manipulative
* Befriend single mothers in order to get to the children. They prey on the desperation of the woman who has no support system. They often sleep with the mother
* "Roughhouse" with children--tickling, slapping buttocks, etc.--and use this playful guise when they are in fact touching inappropriately
* Calling young teenage girls "sexy" or making other sexually suggestive comments
There are some myths surrounding the issue of female abusers. Here are some of them.
Myths About Female Abusers
* Females do not sexually abuse
* Females only abuse if coerced or accompainied by a man
* If females sexually abuse, it is gentle, loving, or misguided "motherly" love
* Females only abuse boys
* If you are female and you were abused by a female, then you will be lesbian, if male, gay or misogynist
* If you were sexually abused as a child, you will abuse as an adult
* People who say they were abused by a female are fantasizing or lying. If you are male, you are having sexual fantasies, and if the perpetrator was your mother, you are having incestuous wishes. If you are female you are muddled and it was a man who really abused you
* Women only sexually abuse adolescents
* If a 30-year-old woman were to seduce a 14-year-old boy it would not be sexual abuse, but if a 30-year-old man were to seduce a 14-year-old girl, then it would undoubetedy be so. If a mother has an incestuous relationship with her son in his late teen/early twenties, it is sex between two consenting adults and not sexual abuse
* It is worse to be sexually abused by a woman than by a man.
In my opinion, child molestation is a progression. The perp may have been abused as a child and is acting out his/her own abuse when abusing another child. Or he/she may have observed another child being abused. He/she may have been introduced to pronography either as a child or in later years. Whatever started it, the person continued to feed his fantasies, or whatever you want to call them, and then he/she got the courage to act out the fantasies.
I strongly believe that child pornography will be proven to be the most harmful vice that puts more of our children at risk. I don't think someone can continue to look at these pictures, getting sexual pleasure from them forever and be satisfied. They are going to want more...it'll take more to give them the same sexual thrill. So when the opportunity rises, a child is there and this person is aroused, he/she will act on those urges. I believe this is especially true when the same people who promote child porn believe sex with a child is good and loving. It is sad and disheartening to think that a few sick, evil people can continue getting their way and destroying the innocence, safety, and often the life of our children.
Dov Hikind has raised the reward to $20,000 for finding the perp who sexually attacked two little girls in Boro Park on two seperate incidents.
During my two decades of work as an investigative reporter, I interviewed hundreds of convicted child molesters in prisons across America. My objective was to uncover how they had lured children and teens into abuse and worse. My intention was also to generate a criminal profile that could be shared with parents and law enforcement. Instead, I found child molesters and abductors to be a diverse group that possesses no tidy criminal profile.
So who are these sexual predators?
* Males and Females
* Young Adults, Middle-Aged Adults, and Seniors
* Upper Class, Middle Class, and Disadvantaged
* All Races & Ethnicities
* Vocationally Diverse
In short, pedophilia, or adult sexual attraction to children, does not discriminate by race, gender, class, or age.
One child pornography sting operation by the U.S. Justice Department and Customs Postal Inspectors resulted in well over two hundred arrests. The occupations of those arrested was a virtual rainbow of American life, representing 44% of all occupations listed by the U.S. Department of Labor.
How many child molesters live in the United States?
Approximately 400,000 convicted pedophiles currently reside in the United States, according to Department of Justice estimates.*
Are there really female child molesters?
Yes. A 2000 statistical report by the US Department of Justice* found that female offenders victimized:
* 12% of victims under the age of 6
* 6% of victims ages 6 - 12
* 3% of victims ages 12 - 17
How many victims does a child molester average?
Interviews guaranteeing complete confidentiality and immunity from prosecution, conducted by Emory University psychiatrist Dr. Gene Abel*, uncovered that:
* Male offenders who abused girls had an average of 52 victims each.
* Men who molested boys had an astonishing average of 150 victims each.
* Only 3% of these crimes had ever been detected.
How do child molesters get into situations where they can exploit children?
Due to the nature of their sexual addiction, few pedophiles are able to resist their powerful urges to initiate contact with children and will go to great lengths to do so. Common strategies include:
* Befriending parents, particularly single parents, to gain access to their children.
* Offering babysitting services to overextended parents or caregivers.
* Taking jobs and participating in community events that involve children.
* Attending sporting events for children and/or offering to coach children's sports.
* Volunteering in youth organizations, offering to chaperone overnight trips.
* Loitering in places children frequent - playgrounds, malls, game arcades, etc.
* Spending time in Internet gaming and social communities, learning the online interests and lingo of youngsters.
* Becoming foster parents.
What is the most common method used by child molesters?
The Affection Lure. (See Think First & Stay Safe Parent Guide) Most victims of abuse are "groomed" over a period of weeks, months, or years. The Affection Lure is used both offline and online to seduce unsuspecting youngsters in need of love and attention. Child molesters have repeatedly told me: When there's a physically or emotionally absent parent in the picture, it makes the child more vulnerable than ever.
Which age group is most often targeted by child molesters?
In the interviews I conducted, the majority of molesters cited a preference for children on the brink of puberty. This is the age of sexual awakening, making it easy for molesters to prey on the sexual curiosity and ignorance of youngsters. To quote one of the predators I interviewed, "Give me a kid who knows nothing about sex, and you've given me my next victim."
While we as parents are inclined to give pre-teen children more freedom and less supervision, this age group is actually the most vulnerable to abuse and abduction. We must talk frankly and often to our children about "the birds and the bees" and not allow child molesters to educate our children for us.
Wouldn't a vigilant parent be able to detect a child molester, just by their actions?
Not necessarily. Always remember:
* Pedophiles are notoriously friendly, nice, kind, engaging and likeable.
* Pedophiles target their victims, often insinuating themselves into that child's life – their family, school, house of worship, sports, and hobbies.
* Pedophiles are professional con artists and are expert at getting children and families to trust them.
* Pedophiles will smile at you, look you right in the eye and make you believe they are trustworthy.
Do kids and teens ever sexually abuse other children?
Sadly, yes – and many of these juvenile offenders are victims of sexual abuse themselves. A U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics report* found that:
* 23% of all sexual offenders were under the age of 18.
* 40% of offenders of victims under age 6 were themselves juveniles
* 13% were 7-11 years old; 27% were 12-17 years old.
* 39% of the offenders of victims ages 7-11 were juveniles.
* 27% of the offenders of victims ages 12 -17 were juveniles.
What types of assaults were these?
Juvenile offenders under the age of 12 were responsible for:
* 23% of forcible sodomies
* 19% of forcible fondlings
* 17% of sexual assaults with an object
* 7% of forcible rapes
Juvenile offenders ages 12 - 18 were responsible for:
* 36% of forcible sodomies
* 27% of forcible fondlings
* 23% of sexual assaults with an object
* 17% of forcible rapes
When and where did these assaults usually happen?
The peak time for juvenile assaults was 3 pm, after school. Other spikes in the number of incidents were at the traditional meal times of 8 am, noon and 6 pm. Most of these assaults happened in the home of the victim, the home of the offender, or another residence.*
How many of these assaults were by family members?
* 49% of offenders of victims under age 6 were family members.
* 42% of offenders of victims ages 7-11 were family members.
* 24% of offenders of victims ages 12 - 17 were family members.*
Are there groups of organized pedophiles that prey on children?
Yes. Small groups of militant and highly organized child molesters operate worldwide through pedophile organizations, whose members claim genuine concern for the welfare of children. The actual number of members in these organizations is unknown, though their power is evident. One pedophile organization's newsletter correctly identified ten sting operations in five different states. Another exposed and compromised four federal sting operations. Clearly, these organizations have connections.
What are their beliefs and goals?
In general, these groups believe that sex with children is harmless; some even claim that sexual relations are healthy for children. Their goals include decriminalizing child molestation and lowering the age of consent.
Where do they meet?
In addition to attending pedophile conferences and conventions, members now meet primarily via the Internet where they may swap methods, success stories, even names, descriptions, and images of children. Since the early 1980's, they have exploited the Internet to communicate with one another, spreading their propaganda to anyone who will listen.
Aren't their activities illegal?
Most pedophile groups and members are careful to keep their public activities within the realm of protected civil liberties.
In 2006, a new political party (PNVD) was established in the Netherlands. Commonly referred to as "the Pedophile Party," it seeks to lower the age of consent from 16 to 12. Opponents had asked The Hague District Court to bar the party from registering for national elections, but Judge H. Hofhuis ruled: "Freedom of expression, freedom ... of association, including the freedom to set up a political party, can be seen as the basis for a democratic society."
Are these pedophile groups a real threat?
While the average child molester does not belong to a pedophile organization, we would be foolish not to take seriously any group whose members are committed to sexual activity with children.
Final Thoughts:
While there are sexual predators who are organized and whose activities cause public ire, it is the millions of individual sexual predators worldwide whose day-to-day actions and steadfast determination are a far greater threat to the safety of our children. Knowing this – and knowing that we cannot be with our children every moment of every day – it is essential that we teach them how to recognize and evade the lures used for generations by sexual predators of every kind. As I told President Bush during the 2002 White House Conference on Missing, Exploited and Runaway Children, "If predators are using the lures, shouldn't we be teaching our children these lures?"
Parents would do well to heed the steady increase in juvenile perpetrators, as well as the 3 pm peak for child sexual assaults. This speaks greatly to the need for after school facilities and activities for latch-key children who are at greater risk of victimization, even in their own homes.
It is also important to remember that 2/3rds of all crimes are never reported. When it comes to juvenile sexual assaults, the percentage of unreported crimes is undoubtedly higher, given the nature of the crimes and the tender age of victims.
- Ken Wooden
*Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement: Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics, by Howard N. Snyder, Ph.D.; National Center for Juvenile Justice, July 2000, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs
Article can be read at:
http://www.childluresprevention.com/research/molester.asp
New York - Stupidity Of The The BIG EVENT Concert Ban Played As Color-War By Teens In Camp. VIDEO
Now, several hundred boys will return to yeshiva in September — including to some local institutions — having learned a very dubious lesson at summer camp: that their adult role models at Camp MaNaVu think that the “ban” was so completely ludicrous that it can be openly mocked in a roomful of children, and satirized as a color war breakout. MaNaVu, by the way, has strong ties to Yeshiva Chaim Berlin.
http://www.vosizneias.com/19554/2008/08/20/new-york-stupidity-of-the-the-big-event-concert-ban-played-as-color-war-by-teens-in-camp/#comments
www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-ia-postville-rabbis,0,5187890.story
chicagotribune.com
Rabbis at Agriprocessors plant stage brief walkout
Associated Press
12:30 AM CDT, August 21, 2008
POSTVILLE, Iowa
About 50 rabbis in charge of supervising the kosher slaughter and processing of meat at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville walked off the job Wednesday to protest recent pay cuts.
The rabbis reportedly took the action because of a decrease in pay since a May 12 Immigration raid, the largest in U.S. history. The plant has since drastically reduced production
Agriprocessors spokesman Menachem Lubinsky downplayed the incident, saying the walk-off lasted only 30 minutes after management resolved the issue. But Lubinsky says the issue of decreased pay, as well as increased time between work performed and payment, has been an issue for the rabbis since the raid.
"The rabbis were complaining that they didn't have as much time for overtime and additional shifts," Lubinsky said.
Lubinsky said he could not comment on the financial situation of Agriprocessors because he does not have access to those records.
Former Agriprocessors CEO Sholom Rubashkin, who remains involved in the company, did not return a phone call requesting comment.
Agriprocessors has hired labor agencies to bring in workers from around the country to try to fully staff the plant after 389 of its employees were arrested in the raid.
But turnover remains high as workers have complained about the working and housing conditions.
PERTH, Australia (AFP) — An 86-year-old alleged war criminal accused of murdering a young Jewish man in World War II lost a court battle Wednesday against extradition from Australia to Hungary.
A Perth magistrate ordered Charles Zentai be taken into custody after finding that he was eligible for extradition, but he was later granted bail by a Federal Court judge after his lawyers lodged an appeal.
Zentai is accused of beating to death teenager Peter Balazs in 1944 in Budapest while serving as a soldier in the army of his native Hungary, then allied with Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany.
"I determine that Mr Zentai is eligible for surrender to the Republic of Hungary and therefore he is remanded in custody," said magistrate Barbara Lane........
I'm such a lying putz!
Postville kosher supervisor denies report of walkout
* Author: Ben Harris
* Filed under: Agriprocessors, Kashrut
Thursday
Aug 21,2008
The top kosher supervisor at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville, Rabbi Menachem Weissmandl, is denying reports that some of his rabbis staged a walkout yesterday in frustration over reduced pay. The Jewish Star reports that Weissmandl “denied emphatically” that the rabbis “staged any sort of job action Wednesday.”
Weissmandl admits, however, the essential details of what was reported — there have been delays in payments to the supervisors, work shifts (and thus total income) for the rabbis have been reduced, a complaint was made to management about it yesterday, and production was interrupted as a result. Weissmandl says what took place was an impromptu “conversation” that the rabbis engaged in when they spotted Heshy Rubashkin on the production floor. He said the conversation should have happened after hours and called it “shlemazeldik” — not sure exactly what that means, but shlemazel is Yiddish for “unlucky person.”
In general, a fee for kosher supervision is paid to a certifying agency who then hires the rabbis who provide the supervision — in this case Agriprocessors pays Weissmandl who then hires the supervisors, who are technically considered his employees. The Star reports that the company has met its financial obligations to Weissmandl in a “timely” manner. He would not say, though, whether it is he or Agriprocessors that directly pays the kosher supervisors.
What's wrong with a principal showing his talmidim some affection?
yehuda nussbaum also groped the sexual organ of his students under the pretense of having them read from the chumash. Feeling their genitalia is a sign of love for the child that shouldn't be associated with doing anything wrong.
---
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3586090,00.html
'Principal groped children while discussing studies'
Former principal of school in West Bank indicted on charges of inviting students into his office, touching their sexual organs while discussing schoolwork
Aviad Glickman
Published: 08.21.08, 22:28 / Israel News
A former principal of an elementary school in one of the West Bank settlements was indicted Thursday and charged with molesting students aged 10-14. The affair was first reported by Ynet.
Exposed
Principal arrested on molestation charges / Efrat Weiss
Principal of West Bank school arrested on suspicion of having inappropriately touched dozens of teenage male students. Suspect denies all charges
Full story
The indictment, submitted to the Kfar Saba Magistrates' Court, charges the former principal who was recently made an inspector with inviting students into his office, forcing them to sit on his lap, and touching their sexual organs.
In one case he asked a 12-year-old student to come to his office, locked the door, and asked the student to sit on his knee. He then proceeded to touch the boy's chest and stomach. In another incident he sat a student on his lap in his office and touched his sexual organ while discussing the boy's studies.
Another incident occurred a few years ago, when two 10-year-old students slipped in a puddle and got wet. He invited them into his office, locked the door, and stood them on chairs facing the air conditioning while he removed their clothing and touched their bodies. They had to wait until fresh clothes were delivered, when the principal dressed one of them himself.
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The final charge describes a case that took place during a field trip this year. During a visit to a water tunnel the defendant ordered the children to crowd together in order to allow more students to enter, and then exploited the darkness and crowding in the small space in order to grope one child's sexual organ and spank another, telling him, "Now I have the chance to give it to you for what you did during the whole year."
Haredi rabbis call for renewing Temple Mount ban
By Nadav Shragai
Israel's leading ultra-Orthodox rabbis are waging a new offensive against Jews visiting Jerusalem's Temple Mount.
Rabbis Shalom Elyashiv, Chaim Kanievsky and Ovadia Yosef sent a letter recently to Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovich, the overseer of holy places in the Western Wall complex, urging him to reiterate the religious decree signed 40 years ago by most rabbis in Israel forbidding Jews from entering the Mount.
The rabbis' efforts follow the publication in Haaretz last month of the visit of Rabbi Moshe Tendler, the son-in-law of prominent U.S. rabbi Moshe Epstein, to the Temple Mount.
Rabbi Tendler was photographed visiting the plaza atop the Mount, where the Dome of the Rock Islamic shrine now sits, igniting a firestorm of controversy in the ultra-Orthodox community. Several other prominent ultra-Orthodox rabbis have ascended the Mount in recent years, including Rabbi Dov Kook of Tiberias, the husband of Elyashiv's granddaughter.
http://www.jta.org/cgi-bin/iowa/breaking/110079.html
An animal rights group is calling for a New York state investigation into kapporos in Brooklyn.
For the second year, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has complained about the High Holidays ritual of swinging a chicken over one’s head, a sin transference ceremony.
In a letter sent Monday to the state agriculture department’s Kosher Law Enforcement division, PETA alleges that thousands of dead chickens were thrown away in dumpsters after the ritual last year in one Brooklyn center.
The letter singles out the kapporos center run in Crown Heights by Rabbi Shea Hecht, and asks the state to investigate whether consumer fraud occurred. Jews who bought chickens for the ritual expected the birds “to be processed for meat that would be distributed as tzedakah,” or charity, the letter states.
Last summer’s complaint to the state and city was more wide ranging, alleging a variety of health and safety violations as well as animal cruelty. It spurred a meeting of more than a dozen rabbis in Brooklyn, and they sent out directives to kapporos centers saying they needed full-time rabbinic supervision.
A related letter was submitted to the Kashrus Information Center, an independent association of more than 100 rabbis that monitors kosher affairs in Brooklyn.
Rabbi Moshe Weiner, the Kashrus center’s rabbinic administrator, told JTA that Hecht’s site and others operated by communal organizations are well run.
While there have been problems in the past from “fly-by-night” kapporos centers, Weiner said proactive steps taken by rabbis last year significantly cut down on such problems.
I had to chuckle to myself when Rabbi Wolf made these "Jewish" comments about my character.
---------------------------------
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/08/obama_and_jews.html
The article features many friends of Obama citing his brilliance. Perhaps the silliest comments come from Rabbi Wolf:
The rabbi's own feeling is that Obama is "sort of Jewish in a way. His overachieving is Jewish, his intellectualism is Jewish, even his charisma has a Jewish side. Maybe I feel it more strongly than others do, but I feel like he's one of us.
"I like McCain too, but he ain't one of us," he added.
Harley owner on crusade to help abused children
By Kate Miller
He speaks with a Brooklyn, N.Y., accent. While living with his American-born parents, he was a soldier in the Israeli Army. He rides a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, a hobby that turned into a crusade to help abused children. His nickname is "Rabbi."
And he's your neighborhood coffee pourer and barkeep.
Natalie Grotts, 19, of Pacific, is a cook at the Great Pacific Coffee House, where Jay "Rabbi" Newman is the manager.
"He has a very broad background," Grotts said. "You learn something more about him every day."
Grotts said the things she's learned have come out over the course of many conversations - and many conversations overheard. She said when Newman volunteers information, it's always in the context of the conversation.
Newman, 48, doesn't think he's interesting enough to be featured in a newspaper article, but that's maybe because he's lived his story. He was born in 1960 in Brooklyn and lived there until he was 11, which was long enough to impart on him a permanent accent.
Newman just might hold the honor of being the only Pacific resident who has a Brooklyn accent.
While growing up in New York, "I lived the Jewish Orthodox lifestyle," he said. "Just like people here go to Catholic schools, I went to Jewish schools. My father was a rabbi. We were hardcore Orthodox people. We kept kosher, kept the Sabbath."
Just before his 12th birthday, Newman's parents moved the family to Israel. The move was inspired mostly by religion.
In 1983, when he was a member of the Israeli Army, he was two blocks away when the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, was attacked by terrorists, resulting in the deaths of 241 military personnel.
While living in Israel, Newman gained a love of motorcycles and won his first bike in a poker game.
He lived in Israel until he was 24. When he returned to the United States, he was unsure of where he would settle. He tried his hometown of Brooklyn, then Seattle, and then came to St. Louis because his brother lived here.
"I fell in love with it," Newman said. "To me, it was a big town with a small-town attitude."
He eventually settled in Pacific with his third wife, Dawn, her son from a previous marriage and their two daughters. Newman also has an adult daughter with his first wife; they live in Israel.
Newman said he loves raising his children in Pacific, where neighbors know each other and can count on one another, and where there is open space.
"I think Pacific is the coolest place," Newman said. "I really do."
As manager of the coffee house, "a lot of people ask about the accent, and the name," he said, adding that most people are accepting of his background.
The only time he's ever felt true prejudice was at a motorcycle event held on the grounds of Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau.
"I had a drink with the Ku Klux Klan," said the Jewish man from Brooklyn who is known as "Rabbi."
Newman said the KKK members heard about him and told him not to attend the event. Newman not only disregarded the warning, he went looking for the people who told him not to come.
"We were clear in our opinions. We disagreed. But we sat down and drank shots of Jack (Daniels whiskey) together," Newman said.
Newman's motorcycle hobby turned into a crusade to help abused children several years ago when he was a member of the Kirkwood Harley-Davidson Group.
At a HOG meeting, a man spoke about how bikers could help abused children.
"He tugged a string in my heart," Newman said. "I've been hooked ever since."
Newman recently served as the vice president and state board member for the local chapter of Bikers Against Child Abuse. The group made up of bikers works with individuals and groups, including the Division of Family Services, to visit children who are coping with all types of abuse. The idea is to help them become survivors by giving them the tools to feel empowered.
"We 'adopt' the child. We ride to that child's house, we tell the child they did nothing wrong. We assure them that if they need us, they can call and someone will be there within an hour," Newman said. "They can call us 24/7, 365 days a year."
Newman has been a member long enough to see some of the children grow up. He remembered a young man whom he met as a child who had been severely abused by his stepfather.
"He was a little frail boy, had nightmares, was afraid to go outside. He was hiding behind his mom and afraid of us," Newman remembered about the day he met the boy. "Today, this boy is a senior in high school, perfect grades, and he's not afraid of anybody."
At age 16, the boy attended a HOG meeting to talk about how the bikers had changed his life.
"He told his story and how BACA saved his life. There wasn't a dry eye in the place," Newman said.
"Sensitive biker" may seem like an oxymoron to some, including those who have seen Newman riding through town in his biker getup.
"When you see him on his motorcycle, with his shirt with the crossbones and such, some would think 'not a nice guy,' but that is not the case," said Toni Sattman, who stops by the Great Pacific Coffee House a few times a week, often with her friend Maxine Birdsong.
"Jay's fantastic. He makes the place because he's fun and personable. He's no tough guy; he's a teddy bear," Sattman said.
Grotts, the coffee house cook, said some of Newman's outward characteristics - the accent, gravelly smoker's voice and sometimes "biker" look - may give off a wrong first impression.
"I thought, when I met him, he would be (difficult to work for), but he's very fun, and he has a good work ethic," she said. "I think he's the best boss I've ever had."
Customers like him, too.
"There are customers who call to see if he's in," Grotts said. "When you say yes, then they say they're coming in."
For more information on BACA, visit www.bacausa.com.
Desperate Housewives actress Terri Hatcher, probably made up the allegations against her uncle, and her testimony would not have been accepted by any bais din.
-
The former uncle of Desperate Housewives actress Terri Hatcher has died in prison of colon cancer. Hatcher helped put her uncle Richard Hayes Stone behind bars after she told authorities that he molested her in the late 1960’s and early ‘70s, when she was no more than 7-years-old.
Stone was convicted in 2002 of molesting two young girls, one of them California teen Sarah Van Cleemput who committed suicide. Cleemput left a note before shooting herself. “You’re probably thinking a normal teenager doesn’t do this; well, ask Dick!” the not read.
Investigators linked “Dick” to Stone, who was a close friend of the Cleemput’s family. Hatcher went to police with her story after reading about Cleemput’s death in a newspaper.
In 2006 Hatcher went public with her story and admitted that she struggled to decide if she should go to authorities. “At the end of the day, there was no way I was not going to put this girl first, before whatever damage might be done to me,” she said.
Hatcher’s admissions about Stone were entered as evidence and he pleaded guilty to child molestation charges. Stone was sentenced to 14 years in prison. He died this week at the age of 70.
Hatcher said she kept the sexual abuse secret from her entire family. “That’s a victim thing; you ask yourself, ‘Am I just crazy? Did I make all this up?’ Somehow it might be easier to accept that you’re crazy and made it all up than to admit that it happened, and how awful it was,” she told Vanity Fair in 2006.
The now 43-year-old said she last saw her uncle when she was around 8-years-old.
At no time did yudi kolko molest any campers while employed by us. Please direct all further inquiries to rabbi avi "no comment" shafran.
http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/warren-county/index.ssf?/base/news-0/121877314712060.xml&coll=3
Camp sued over molester
Parents of boy sexually assaulted by counselor file suit against North Warren YMCA camp.
Friday, August 15, 2008
By TOM QUIGLEY
The Express-Times
BELVIDERE | The parents of a boy among those sexually molested by a counselor at a North Warren YMCA camp filed suit against the camp.
Robert Dion Fayte Williams, 25, of Pilot Knob, Mo., was arrested in August 2005 and charged with sexually assaulting a then-12-year-old boy at YMCA Camp Ralph S. Mason in Hardwick Township. He also showed eight campers pornographic material Aug. 12, 2005.
He molested a then-14-year-old boy that same night, and another boy, also 14, on July 22, 2005, authorities said.
He pleaded guilty in December 2006 to second-degree sexual assault by contact for molesting the 12-year-old; two counts of third-degree aggravated criminal sexual contact for molesting the two 14-year-old boys and a single second-degree child endangerment count for showing pornography to the children under his charge.
He admitted in court to touching the genitals of all three boys "to humiliate them."
The victim linked to the lawsuit "was on his summer break from middle school and his parents decided to enroll him in a summer program which was being run and operated by defendant YMCA," the lawsuit reads.
It is alleged in the lawsuit that Williams "had a history of inappropriate sexual contact with minors."
The child's parents contend YMCA camp officials were negligent in hiring Williams.
Attorney Paul S. Foreman is representing the boy's family.
"We feel it's despicable that a sexual predator would be put in a position where he would have unfettered access to minors," said Foreman, of Whippany, N.J. "My office intends to vigorously litigate the matter on our clients' behalf."
Those pictures of nussbaum bring chills down my spine. How could I ever forget this monster who not only physically tortured me, but who also had his hands all over me where they shouldn't have been. (i.e. slaps on the rear, wet kisses, and fondling my areas during class lessons).
http://unorthodoxjew.blogspot.com/2005/07/enemy-within.html
gross said...
Shlomo and Yaakov Mandel, sons of R' Manis Mandel ran the Yeshiva of Bklyn Boy's divisin to the ground. Countless boys were viciously beaten, myself included. I remember one of the most "horrible sins" committed by us "rebels" was wearing sneakers that were higher than one's ankle!
Yaakov was in charge of the elementary and conducted more of the beatings. He had a particular penchant for publicly pulling down young boys' pants and viciously beating their behinds.
Shlomo was busy running his "mesivta" but was a real animal too. As "Rosh HaYeshiva" it can be argued that he was the bigger monster for allowing his younger brother to ruin so many peoples lives.
Simply put, they were the Gestapo. I am enraged as I write this and I cannot forget the last time I was hit by one of the Mandels ; it was in the face, by Shlomo, after he summoned me to in front of a gathering of 50 students. I was completely innocent - completely. He publicly threw me out of Yeshiva and declared to the assembled students (7th & 8th grade) how happy he was to be M'kaim the Mitzvah of Chinuch.
I will never forgive Shlomo and cannot wait until his time is up and he will be forced to face the "ultimate grand jury."
Today, the brothers went "splitsville" and Shlomo kicked Yaakov out of the "Yeshiva" blaming him for its failure.
Rumor has it that a few years ago there were some people looking to file a class action lawsuit agains the bums. I don't know what became of it.
Monday, July 25, 2005 8:48:00 PM
Anonymous gross said...
I'd hate to leave out Avrohom Raider - former principal of YOB who wouldn't dare send his own fine children to the boys school lest they suffer too. The last memory I have of Raider was his hulking, obese, sweaty figure, hovering over my skinny 13 year-old frame, repeatedly banging my head against a cinderblock wall.
Monday, July 25, 2005 8:53:00 PM
Blogger Un-Orthodox Jew said...
I heard similar stories from other people,but was unable to get a first hand confirmation until now.
To hell with those SICKOS!!!
Monday, July 25, 2005 9:21:00 PM
Gross,
If you are out there. Might you be so kind as to contact me at:
matzil_nefoshos@yahoo.com
It would be greatly appreciated.
ATTENTION:
I am seeking to validate some disturbing reports about a certain individual who was employed by
"Yeshiva Chofetz Chaim of Suffern NY" (this yeshiva no longer exists).
If you think you can help, please comment or contact me at:
matzil_nefoshos@yahoo.com
Your confidentiality is assured, and you will remain anonymous.
Toda Raba!
The Search for Rose / A family with a history of abuse
By Fadi Eyadat
The neglect and abuse that led to the apparent murder of Rose Pizem by her grandfather Ronny Ron seem to have been endemic in the family, as arises from the story of Ronny Ron's sister, Sigalit Kirschner.
In an unrelated incident, Kirschner was murdered along with her husband Dudi Katzstecher in July, two weeks after the couple married. She accused her family of abusing her as a child, and had been estranged from them for more than 25 years.
"Mom left her family in Netanya when she was 17," Ziv Kirschner, Sigalit Kirschner's eldest son from her first marriage, told Haaretz yesterday. "Ronny was neither at the funeral nor at the shiva, and I've only seen him once or twice."
Meanwhile, neighbors of the Ron family who knew Sigalit Kirschner as a child were surprised to hear she had been murdered. They said that as a child, Kirschner had been neglected by her mother, Vivien Yaakov, and had even complained that she had been sexually assaulted, a claim the neighbors said was never investigated. "She severed ties with them because she had a difficult family life," they said. "She was the sweetest girl in the world. [Her mother] Vivien didn't sit shiva for her or tell us [that she died.]"
Shortly before he died, Sigalit's father, Yehezkel Yaakov, went to see his daughter and ask for forgiveness for the abuse she suffered as a child. "Mom was like a slave in that house," Ziv Kirschner said. "Vivien and Ronny abused her, so she had to run away. She served in the army and then built herself a life without outside support. Got married, had children and educated us."
Sigalit Kirschner and Katzstecher were murdered only two weeks after their wedding by security guard Erez Ben Ezra, who had encountered financial difficulties. Ben Ezra asked Katzstecher, a taxi driver, to drive him to a rabbi's grave near Safed. On the way, he killed Katzstecher and his wife, who had accompanied him, near the town of Kadita and stole NIS 600. Police matched the bullets at the scene of the crime with Ben Ezra's gun. Two days after the murder, with the police on his trail, Ben Ezra committed suicide.
"Luckily, she separated from her family and had us," Ziv Kirschner said yesterday. "I still can't understand why someone would murder for NIS 600, but killing a little girl for no apparent reason is even more brutal."
The nerve center, however, remains 770 Eastern Parkway, which has such cachet because it was the home and synagogue of Schneerson, the Chabad-Lubavitch's head rabbi from 1950 until his death in 1994. He is credited with turning a demoralized group of Lubavitch Jews that had moved to Brooklyn in the wake of World War II into a multimillion-dollar global empire that spans more than 70 countries, boasts hundreds of thousands of devotees, and has established beachheads on more than 100 American college campuses.
You'd be hard-pressed to find anyone in Crown Heights who could point to a single character flaw that the rebbe possessed—or still possesses, because people like Sara Kanevsky insist that he never died.
Full Article----
http://www.villagevoice.com/2008-08-27/news/the-crown-heights-lubavitchers/
RABBI FLEES MOB
hg.editorial@archant.co.uk
06 August 2008
A CAMPAIGNING rabbi feared he was going to be killed as he was chased by a huge crowd of Chasidic Jews.
Rabbi Nochum Rosenberg, originally from New York, America, was forced to flee from a Stamford Hill synagogue where he had been listening to a lecture on July 24.
He ran into Manor Road, and was taken to safety after stopping a passing police car.
Rabbi Rosenberg, campaigns to uncover child abuse in strictly orthodox communities, and he believes it's his work that led to the chaos.
"Some find my work very irritating as a result I have a lot of friends but also a lot of enemies.
"I was listening to the lecture in the synagogue but with more and more people coming in, it was getting a little crowded.
"I decided to leave but some people followed me and more came as word spread that I was there, they were all talking on their cellphones.
"A car mounted the pavement in front of me and everyone was shouting foul abusive language at me.
"I started to run and they chased me there must have been about 200 of them
"I thank god that the police came when they did, I shouted for them to help me saying the crowd were trying to kill me.
Police officers took Rabbi Rosenberg to Stoke Newington Police Station, before moving him to a hotel, where he stayed before returning to the States on July 27.
A spokeswoman for Hackney police said: "Officers were driving down Lordship Road at around 11.50pm.
"They saw a crowd of around 200 Chasidic Jewish men acting in a violent manner towards one man.
"The officers made there presence felt and once he was taken away the disorder ended."
Rabbi Rosenberg, is determined to continue fighting child abuse in Orthodox Jewish communities.
The 58-year-old said: "I was very surprised at what happened, it's my work that caused it, but I don't do anything bad.
"The Jewish community must deal with child molestation and not sweep it under the rug.
Women locked inside Breslov synagogue
New guidelines imposed by Safed's Breslov community determine women must leave Shabbat service before final prayer or they are locked inside gallery until men make their exit; women undecided as to whether rule is respectful or degrading
Pnina Geffen
Guests that have recently stayed in cabins in Safed owned by the city's Hasidic Breslov community were surprised to discover that a new list of guidelines was being imposed: Women had to dress according to Meah Shearim standards (meaning long sleeves, long skirt, stockings, and a head cover for married women).
But apparently this was not enough for the community to meet its own modesty requirements, and recently a new rule was implemented, requiring different exit times from the synagogue following Shabbat prayers.
Modesty
'Girls, go to the back' / Neta Sela
Rabbinical transportation committee calls on young women to ride buses in halachic manner, meaning to congregate in back of bus, even in those buses not deemed 'kosher', in which driver won't open back door
Full story
According to the new rule, women must leave the synagogue before the 'Aleinu Leshabeach' prayer is recited, after which the women's gallery is locked for 15 minutes, during which the men make their exit. The women's gallery is then reopened to allow those who didn't make it out in time to leave.
The Breslov community's synagogue in Safed is a popular spot for Saturday services due to its old-world architecture and authentic Hasidic dances. It is owned by Rabbi Elazar Mordechai Koenig, whose father was a student of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov's closest pupil.
The decision to separate between women and men exiting the synagogue stems from Safed's structure, known for its narrow alleyways and streets. The synagogue opens onto one such street, forcing the people coming out after services to crowd together, and forcing the men to restrict the women's exit.
"In the beginning we thought someone had locked the women's gallery from outside by mistake, but as time went on we realized we had been locked in purposefully, without being informed," said Noa, a guest who attended Shabbat services.
"It was horrible; dozens of women banging on the door trying to get out. In the men's gallery someone yelled to the manager 'the women have been locked in!' The men didn't know about it either, and many of them stood helplessly outside waiting for their wives."
Degrading or respectful?
Avital, resident of Safed and the wife of a yeshiva student, was also surprised. "We've been praying here for years, I'm pretty shocked. It's really degrading to lock up women like that," she said.
Maya, a member of the community, had a different opinion. "They're degraded that boys aren't crowding and pushing between them? This separation doesn't degrade me, just the opposite, it respects me. I can leave in peace a little before the end of prayers without all of the pushing outside," she explained.
Her husband Ofer agrees with her. "The Torah commands us to maintain holiness not just inside the home but also outside, in the public sphere," he claims. "It's true that it's not natural, but the Torah isn't natural, it wants to correct our nature and make us better people.
"Today urges have become natural, like you have to accept it unconditionally. I want to curb the urge rather than have it curb me. Today the situation is, urges are fine and the Torah is not." Regarding the lack of notification about the locking of the women's gallery Maya said a sign had been hung, "but perhaps they didn't see it."
Victims of YOB, YTT, NIRC, GER, BOVBOV, SATMAR, and the like, should all come forward. It's never too late!
School sex-abuse victims urged to come forward
August 27, 2008 - 8:18PM
Police suspect dozens of boys may have been abused during hypnotic "prayer" sessions at a top NSW boarding school.
St Stanislaus' College at Bathurst, in central west NSW, is reeling after 13 former students alleged sexual abuse by staff during from the 1970s and into the early 1980s.
A 65-year-old former priest is facing 33 charges, after allegations a pedophile ring of priests and staff operated at the school, which has both boarders and day students.
He was charged on May 23 with offences relating to sexual assault and gross acts of indecency of boys aged between 10 and 18 years old, police said.
The shocking revelations today prompted one former student to tell his story of abuse at the school in 1971, for which he eventually received an out-of-court settlement.
The man, who asked only to be known as "John", said he was sexually abused three times in April 1971 by a priest who left St Stanislaus' a few years later.
"I still remember it," John told said.
"I carry that stench on my back ever since the day it happened.
"I was a day boy and I was not the only victim back then."
In the mid-1990s, he contacted the Vincentian order of priests, which run the school and operate separately from the Bathurst Catholic diocese.
He eventually settled out of court for just over $40,000.
He said criminal proceedings against the priest never went past the committal hearing due to lack of evidence.
Currently, 615 boys attend St Stanislaus', of which 188 are borders.
St Stanislaus' principal John Edwards said he first became aware of the allegations "several years ago" and referred the claims to police.
"The college received some internet material which contained allegations that I think are linked to the ones that are currently taking place," he told Fairfax Radio Network today.
"Those matters were referred to the police some years ago."
He said the material included claims of late night prayer and chanting sessions in which boys were sexually abused.
Mr Edwards said the school was served with a search warrant on July 3 which stated the names of three former staff members.
"I'm not able to comment any further," Mr Edwards said.
Police have released scant information but want other victims of alleged abuse to contact them.
However, they would not confirm reports the abused students were hypnotised and drugged.
"All I can say is that the NSW Police Force will be providing every form of support we possibly can to make the process for them as trouble-free as possible," Detective Superintendent Michael Goodwin told reporters in Sydney today.
Supt Goodwin would not reveal how many suspects were being investigated, but said none still worked at the school.
"I can confirm that there's no one at the school at the moment that is subject to that inquiry," he said.
"At this stage, we're looking at 13 victims and we're following up those lines of inquiry at the moment."
A spokeswoman for the Bathurst diocese would not comment, saying the Vincentian priests operates separately from the diocese.
A spokesman for the Sydney archdiocese said Cardinal George Pell would not comment because Bathurst lies outside his jurisdiction.
Father Ian McGinnity, chairman of the National Council of Priests of Australia, said great care was taken at boarding schools, but sex abuse remained in all parts of society.
"It still doesn't take away the unfortunate reality of human nature," Fr McGinnity told AAP.
"There are people who sometimes have sicknesses in psycho-sexual arenas and that happens whether they're priests or lay people."
The office of Vincentian priests at Bathurst and their provincial office in Sydney did not comment when contacted.
AAP
This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/national/school-sexabuse-victims-urged-to-come-forward-20080827-43ya.html
How he can allow nussbaum to continue working at yob is a crime which he is chyav misa
Another puddle of mud is peachy (8th grade rebbe) who was one of the main obstacles in preventing the police from being called and having nussbaum removed from ever teaching again at yob. Peachy is a vicious child abuse enabler and the olam need to know about this creep.
Mandel and Peachy are blatant destroyers of yiddisshe neshamas. It goes even beyond what was mentioned above. It is absolutely grotesque!
In order to protect the identity of additional Nussbaum victims - I cannot expand anymore.
EM
http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a13292/News/New_York.html
BREAKING NEWS: Satmar Teacher Accused of Sexual Abuse by Former Student
by Staff Report
A teacher at a prominent Satmar yeshiva in Williamsburg has been accused of sexual assault and abuse by a former student.
In court papers filed Wednesday, Joel Engelman is seeking $5 million in
damages from Rabbi Avorohom Reichman, the yeshiva, the United Talmudical
Academy and the Satmar Bungalow Colony, where Reichman also teaches in the
sect¹s summer camp in upstate White Lake.
The civil complaint alleges that Engelman, now 23, was 8 years old in 1993
when Rabbi Reichman sexually assaulted him. The suit alleges that Engelman
"suffered psychological and physical injury, which required medical and
psychological treatment," as a result of the abuse.
The suit also alleges that the school "continues to lack basic rules
protecting children from sexual assault."
It states that a deal was in place in April whereby the Engelman family
agreed not to pursue legal action in return for Reichman¹s resignation from
the school and the camp. But Rabbi Reichman, according to the suit, was
videotaped teaching at the camp in July, after the statute of limitations
for a criminal prosecution had run out.
"The defendants fraudulently induced Joel Engelman to enter into this
exchange of mutual promises, and oral contract," the suit alleges.
It also claims that various Satmar officials investigated Engelman's
allegations and found that "there were multiple, credible complaints of
sexual abuse made against Reichman."
Calls to United Talmudical Academy and the Satmar Bungalow Colony for
comment were not returned.
"I really didn¹t want this to get into the courts," Engelman told The Jewish
Week. "Had they done things differently [and fired Reichman], I probably
wouldn¹t have sued. This is the last thing I wanted."
Engelman's sexual abuse allegations are the latest in a string of such
charges made by former male yeshiva students in ultra-Orthodox schools in
Brooklyn.
Rabbi Yehuda Kolko, a first grade teacher at Yeshiva Torah Temima in
Flatbush, recently plead guilty to two counts of endangering the welfare of
a child after being charged with several counts of sexual abuse. Brooklyn
District Attorney Charles Hynes defended the last-minute plea, citing the
young age of the plaintiff.
Several civil suits pending against Rabbi Kolko and the school seek a total
some $50 million in damages.
I will issue a Hzmanha for Loshan Hara to anyone who dares speak about Joseph Shereshevsky.
Rabbi Chaim Silver is correct and you should refrain from gossiping.
------------------------------------
Published on HamptonRoads.com | PilotOnline.com (http://hamptonroads.com)
Little outcry heard from alleged victims of pyramid scheme
NORFOLK
Investor Joseph Shereshevsky's fellow Orthodox Jews are the principal victims he allegedly defrauded in a multimillion-dollar pyramid scheme, prosecutors say.
But there's little public outcry coming from his synagogue, B'nai Israel Congregation, and Jewish law may be part of the reason.
At the first Saturday service after Shereshevsky's Aug. 11 arrest, Rabbi Chaim Silver reminded members that Judaism forbids gossip, also known as "lashon hara," or evil speech.
Participants at the service said Silver did not cite the scandal. But they said the connection was as obvious as the shock generated by the allegations against Shereshevsky.
"I don't think there's a single person in the community it hasn't affected in some way, just because he was a benefactor and so many people had invested in or worked for him," said a member who asked not to be identified.
Silver did not return several calls for comment. Other members also did not return calls, or refused to comment on Shereshevsky.
Shereshevsky is accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission of diverting $100 million from investors with WexTrust Capital, where he was chief operating officer. His business partner, Steven Byers, also was charged.
Prosecutors call it an affinity-fraud case because Shereshevsky allegedly targeted other Orthodox Jews, in addition to other individuals.
In South Hampton Roads' small Orthodox community, he became known in recent years as a generous donor to B'nai Israel, charities and the Orthodox day school that was launched in 2002.
Known as the Rabbi Chaim Shereshevsky Institute of Mesorah Learning, the school is named for Shereshevsky's father. Directors of the school did not return calls.
The silences may reflect not only the ban on gossip but a Jewish custom that frowns on being a "moser," or informant, said Samuel Heilman. A sociologist at City University of New York, Heilman writes about American Judaism and Orthodox Jews.
"The moser is somebody who hands over, literally, information that is hurtful regarding Jews to someone - to the authorities," he said. The custom harkens to Jewish historical experience with anti-Semitic civic authorities.
"The silence speaks volumes - there's an obvious embarrassment about this," Heilman said of the Norfolk congregation's quiet.
Banned from criticism, reluctant perhaps to commend the accused, for most members, "the most obvious and best tactic is to say nothing," Heilman said.
Jonathan D. Sarna, a Brandeis University scholar of Jewish history, said close-knit Orthodox communities can sometimes function as sub-economies, or networks for doing business or trading information.
"The price you pay is that that can also be abused and it's always very painful, much as it is in a family when a family member turns out to not be honest," he said.
Rabbi Lawrence Forman, a longtime Reform clergyman in Norfolk, said he was not close to the Orthodox but was nonetheless outraged as a Jew by Shereshevsky's alleged crimes.
"He's forcing a bad name on the community," Forman said. "It starts with his fellow Orthodox and extends to anybody who calls himself Jewish."
But Harry Graber, executive vice president of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater, disputed that Shereshevsky was bad PR for all Jews.
"I thank God that the world has reached a certain level of sophistication that those kinds of broad-brush associations are a thing of the past," said Graber, who doesn't know Shereshevsky. "We feel bad for the people who were fooled, both Jewish and non-Jewish."
Either way, the case will have an obvious fascination for outsiders, much as past scandals involving Protestant televangelists or the Catholic priest sex-abuse revelations, Heilman said.
"The question arises: How could a person who is so religious do something illegal or immoral, and that's what makes this a story," he said.
Steven G. Vegh, (757) 446-2417, steven.vegh@pilotonline.com
We support Shelly Silver.
The girl deserved what she got. When kinderlach have no hakoras hatov these things happen.
Israelis in Anguish Over the Abuse and Murder of a 4-Year-Old
By ETHAN BRONNER
JERUSALEM — Israel is in the grip of a nightmarish tale of cross-generational infidelity, child abuse and murder. The story is blanketing the news media while police detectives speak of never having been so shaken by a case, and an anguished nation is asking how it could happen here, in a society that considers itself especially caring and intimate.
The story centers on the killing of a blue-eyed, four-year-old French girl named Rose, her guileless smile haunting the front page of every newspaper. The police say she was killed by her grandfather, a 45-year-old Israeli who had lured her mother away from his own son, the dead girl’s father, to be his lover. They say the man has confessed to having stuffed the child’s body into a red suitcase and dumped it into a river. Divers are searching.
Those are the bare outlines, but the details of familial dysfunction over many years, recounted by the police and lawyers in news conferences, only add to the horror that has so gripped Israelis.
The grandfather, an unemployed taxi driver named Ronny Ron, was living with the girl’s mother, 23-year-old Marie Pisam. Together they have two daughters of their own.
Their relationship began four years ago when Marie and her husband, Benjamin, Mr. Ron’s biological son, came with the infant Rose from France to meet him. They had learned that Mr. Ron was his father when Benjamin’s mother, who raised him alone in France, told them that she had become pregnant while on a tour of Israel years ago.
In full...
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/28/world/middleeast/28rose.html?_r=1&em=&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin
Legislation won't help
By Haaretz Editorial
The four years of Rose Pizem's life were characterized by severe, at times unbelievably tortuous, suffering, and her tragic end was apparently even crueler. The story of this child's life is so extraordinary in every way that it is hard to make quick conclusions and draw lessons from it for all of society. The proposals to impose the death penalty on child murderers will not save the next child whose close relatives decide to get rid of him. No punishment is relevant in such cases.
To conclude it is possible to prevent the kind of suffering Rose Pizem endured by means of legislation increasing supervision of parents is wrong. It will not prevent extreme cases of family dysfunction, as there was in this case. In both Rose's nuclear and extended family there were people who abused her, each in his own way, and who had experienced abuse as well. The entire family chain was unable to provide support for this unfortunate child - and sealed her fate.
Therefore, the proposals of recent days calling for a change in legislation and punishment, suitability tests for parenthood and similar ideas that exploit the tragic story to forge a new order in supervision are pointless, useless and illogical.
Grief does not have to be translated into hysteria. The social welfare authorities have the power to do a great deal in cases where they know what is happening, and there is no reason to give them a freer hand from now on to remove children from their parents' homes. Every case is different, and alert neighbors do not have to conclude that every crying child is a victim of abuse by the family and should be given up for adoption.
Rose Pizem was too young to be under the watchful eye of the educational and social welfare institutions, which are skilled at identifying abuse based on the behavior of children in nursery or elementary school. She was a victim of migration from one country to another, because important information about her life was not transferred from the French courts to the Israeli social welfare authorities. Perhaps in the area of international reporting there is something to learn from this case. But Rose Pizem was mainly a victim of human evil and exceptional dysfunction, of the type that the authorities can only limit as much as possible, but not prevent entirely.
Thousands of children grow up in families that are unable to provide them with security and happiness, and many of the parents who turn to cruelty are second- or third-generation child abusers. In a society that sanctifies privacy, it is difficult to know what is happening in the homes of the nuclear or extended family, even in an intimate country like Israel, especially when there is no obvious physical evidence of abuse.
The child Rose Pizem suffered at the hands of her parents, her grandfather, her parents' partners in Israel and abroad. If there was anyone outside the family who knew and did not report, he certainly bears responsibility. Had the child been removed from her family as early as possible, she may have had a chance for a good life with an adoptive family. Had the authorities been aware of her true situation, they had the legal means to act on her behalf. No legislative change is needed for the authorities to be able to carry out their task, with at least partial success.
Does this study take into account if there was any penetration involved?
---------------------------------
More children gaining courage to report sex abuse
By David Reynolds
Staff Writer
Thursday, August 28, 2008 at 10:09 p.m.
This month authorities arrested numerous alleged sex offenders and uncovered the abuse of more than a dozen children.
The recent upswing in sex cases, officials say, doesn’t mean child sexual abuse is more common, but that it’s a persistent problem people are more willing to address.
“Unfortunately, I believe this type of behavior is part of our society,” said Detective Sgt. Scott Lawson of the Pender County Sheriff’s Office Special Victims Unit.
But as people become more willing to discuss sexual abuse, kids are gaining the courage they need to report it, Lawson said. “They are not considering it such a taboo topic. They’re realizing, ‘I don’t have to take this anymore.’”
In August alone, Lawson has investigated three child sexual abuse cases. The crime spans racial and economic boundaries, he said. And in the recent cases, the only similarity is that an adult abused a child, and the child had someone they could tell.
“It’s a wake-up call for parents to have an open line of communication with their children,” Lawson said. “They need to know to have that talk with their child.”
Numerous allegations
On Aug. 5, Pender County deputies charged Tracy Denise Shepard, 42, of Hampstead with abusing several children, ages 3 to 7.
Two weeks later, they searched the home of 36-year-old Burgaw resident Dennis Stephen Johnson and seized computer and photography equipment. Johnston faces allegations he abused several children, boys and girls, who are between 5 and their mid-teens.
The investigation began when a parent made an allegation, and then deputies found other victims, Lawson said.
Also this month, federal authorities charged five men with allegations involving child pornography. One of them is former Pender County resident Travis Dittrich, 37, according to a statement from U.S. Attorney General George E.B. Holding’s office.
The federal indictment stems from a Pender County Sheriff’s Office investigation of Dittrich in 2006, Lawson said.
Now, the sheriff’s office is looking for 38-year-old Isidro Garcia Gazca, who officials say abused multiple children, and threatened them so they wouldn’t tell.
Authorities suspect Gazca is in Southeastern North Carolina or Grand Rapids, Mich.
While Pender County has had a flurry of cases, experts say child sexual abuse is a problem for police everywhere. On Sunday, New Hanover County sheriff’s deputies responded to a home on Castle Hayne Road and arrested Eduarado Contreras Chavez, 37, who they allege sexually assaulted a 4-year-old.
And then early Tuesday, Wilmington police charged a man who they say was looking at child pornography in a hotel lobby. Officers arrested William Anthony Teachey, 53, and seized more than 100 sexually explicit photos, according to a police statement.
Measuring abuse
Although the region has seen its share of recent cases, experts say sexual abuse of children is under-reported and hard to quantify.
“A lot of children will never tell anyone what’s happened to them,” said Michelle Hughes, vice president of programs for Prevent Child Abuse North Carolina, a nonprofit. “They’re scared, they’re embarrassed.”
Also, different types of cases are reported to different agencies, she said, with social services tracking abuse by caretakers and police tracking abuse by noncaretakers.
But officials with the nonprofit say that when surveyed anonymously, one in four girls in the United States and one in six boys say they’ve been sexually abused.
The Carousel Center in Wilmington collects physical evidence from abused children to prosecute cases and also counsels victims.
During the past three years, the center has treated more than 280 children per year, according to Director April Pickett. Although it’s more than double the 115 children treated in 2002, Pickett attributes the jump to increased reporting, not abuse.
Still, she says the center’s patients don’t represent anywhere near all of the abused children in the 15 counties the center serves.
Rosie Allen, president of Prevent Child Abuse North Carolina, said children who are abused are more likely to use drugs, get pregnant early and have suicidal thoughts. Those risks can be alleviated by counseling, she said.
But when crimes go unreported, children are more likely to be abused again or to grow up and abuse someone else, experts said.
Things to remember
While talking with kids about improper touching is crucial, experts say parents can do many things to protect their children.
Wanda Marino, assistant director of the New Hanover Department of Social Services, said parents should never leave children with adults whom the parents don’t know. Parents also should check their state sex-offender registry to know who is in their area.
Allen, of Prevent Child Abuse North Carolina, recommends background checks on adults who serve children and monitoring children’s Internet use.
Any sudden change of behavior or shrinking from appropriate touching could be signs a child has been abused, officials said.
Lawson said it’s important for parents to be open with their kids to reduce the risk children will be abused. And talking to kids is the first step to stopping abuse that already has happened, Lawson said. If they have no one to tell, it may never stop.
“The kids I talk to have said something to their parents,” he said. “I’ve never had a kid in here whose parents didn’t know anything.”
David Reynolds: 343-2075
dave.reynolds@starnewsonline.com
Imagine if every boy I molested came forward I would have not have been so lucky in getting such a sweet plea deal.
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“A lot of children will never tell anyone what’s happened to them,” said Michelle Hughes, vice president of programs for Prevent Child Abuse North Carolina, a nonprofit. “They’re scared, they’re embarrassed.”
Hey Kolko; keep your big mouth shut. Stop reminding the Jewish community that we let you off so easy. You're making us look stupid.
I think I will write another article and rebuke the Jewish Standard for suggesting that Agriprocessors violated any of these serious allegations mentioned. Do we know the facts? Do they? Word has it the Rubashkins' are nice kosher people and we mustn't judge them unfavorably.
--------------------------
The Jewish Standard - http://www.jstandard.com
Ignoring problems of illegal immigration leads to exploitation
http://www.jstandard.com/articles/4677/1/Ignoring-problems-of-illegal-immigration-leads-to-exploitation
Stephen Steinlight
By Stephen Steinlight
Published on Today
The immigration raid on the Agriprocessors meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa, the largest kosher plant in the country, caught most American Jews completely off guard.
Since the raid in May, which resulted in the arrest of nearly 400 illegal workers, additional serious allegations have emerged against the plant owned by the Brooklyn-based Rubashkin family, including inhumane working conditions, egregious violations of child-labor laws, sexual harassment of female workers, and multiple workplace safety infractions.
I went to YOB and was constantly abused there by the younger and older Mandel. I was punished and shamed numerous times in front of assembled students, as well as in the lunchroom right outside jack Mandel's office.
When I read that Yudi Kolko was proctoring regents at yob, I immediately made a connection to another Torah Temmima employee who physically abused me and classmates.
I don't recall his name now, but he was "chosidisheh" man who worked as a rebbi in the morning at YTT and as an english teacher for limudei chol by YOB.
He was eventually fired after he bruised a 13 year old so bad his parents threatened to call the police.
Fat disgusting "Rabbi" Raider the English principal at the time was an out of control freak that always blamed the students when it was apparent we were being manhandled by this man.
Little pranks turned us into punching bags. A kid turned off the lights and the next thing you know is Jack mandel stoming in to the back of the classroom and slapping the kid sitting next to the light switch across the face many times. Oh what a hellhole! To think this place still exists without the police ever doing a thing all these years makes me very very angry.
Brooklyn, NY - Dov Hikind Puts Yeshivas On Notice With Harsh Warning: I am Going To Publicly Shame You If You Harbor Rebbe Molesters
08-04-2008 - 9:28 AM
Brooklyn, NY - A hard-hitting follow-up to the subject of sexual abuse and molestation in the Orthodox community was heard on Assemblyman Dov Hikind’s radio show this past Motzoei Shabbos.
Hikind opened the first of several sharply-worded salvos heard throughout the program against perpetrators in the frum world.
After expressing his admiration for cheder rebbis for making a difference, Hikind asserted that “My office is committed to doing something. I have actually assigned staff members to work on this. We are going to stick with this. Those who are abusing our children, doing inappropriate things, I’m coming after you in every single way. Quit before your name is released and your family is embarrassed! I will not be silent or shy away.
To listen to the entire show which lasts for about a full hour click below
Hikind then introduced a Williamburg mother whose son had been molested by his menahel at age 8.5 and left Yiddishkeit at 19 as a result. Most significantly, the mother related the years of devastation, isolation, shame and lack of trust in Torah authority figures. “It was a betrayal of his beliefs,” reports the mother.
After a lengthy discussion on how the victim’s family tried to get the menahel to treatment without embarrassing his own family, which didn’t work, the mother reported that even though the menahel failed a lie detector test and was temporarily removed from his position, he has been returned to teaching in summer school and will be returning to yeshivah in September.
Throughout the program, an audibly outraged Hikind raised his voice and said (among other things):
· “…How can one of the most prominent yeshivos, that educates tens of thousands of kids, know they have a molester destroying people’s lives! How can they continue with him? How’s that possible? … Well, we are going to stop him, okay? … We are going to stop that from happening. Period. But that’s not the point. The point is: What is their thinking? Where is their religiosity and their commitment?”
· “Is there anyone out there who accepts abuse of children? This mother tried to do things in a beautiful way, and they betrayed her son again. They just hoped she would go away. Her son felt, ‘Maybe I accomplished something, maybe I got rid of this skunk!’ Then he finds that a person who is sick and who should never be with children again is back on his job? How do you face G-d now? How do you pray in the morning?”
· “My office is devoted to this. We are asking people to come forward… We have staff working on this. We are building cases and cases and cases. The stories that I have heard this week, all from our communities from Lakewood to Monsey to Borough Park to Flatbush.”
· “You know, I gotta tell you. You ask me, ‘How are you?’ I must be honest. I have not been okay since last Shabbos night since doing this show. Because it affects me profoundly to listen, to listen and to listen. And you know what’s putting a dagger through my heart? It’s that people are more interested in protecting the perpetrator than dealing with the victim! That’s the part that’s putting a dagger through my heart and soul.”
The show concluded with the mention of Beth Israel’s new Sexual Abuse Hotline, 212-844-1495, and several calls from supportive and grateful abuse victims.
Of particularly notable mention was Hikind’s reaction to a caller named Yitz, who asked the mother, “Why don’t you go to the police? And why is this sub-human still on the streets?” Hikind replied: “In her case, they are trying to get him out of a classroom. It’s about getting him away from kids, and I have spoken to quite a few rabbonim and you have every right to do this legally. The first objective is to get this guy out of the classroom. If I have to go public, if I have to hold a press conference outside the yeshivah, I will do that! This guy is not going back to the classroom in September. We will make sure that will not happen.”
Article printed from Vos Iz Neias - (Yiddish:What’s News?): http://www.vosizneias.com
URL to article: http://www.vosizneias.com/18867/2008/08/04/brooklyn-ny-dov-hikind-puts-yeshivas-on-notice-with-harsh-warning-i-am-going-to-publicly-shame-you-if-you-harbor-rebbe-molesters/
By Lynda Waddington 8/29/08 5:36 PM
Staff in the Iowa Attorney General’s Office have confirmed that investigators executed a search warrant at Agriprocessors this morning, but they provided few other details.
The investigation, led by the Iowa Division of Labor and Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, has continued in the wake of 57 cases of potential child labor law violations being passed to the Attorney General’s Office for prosecution.
“Agents from the [DCI] came today to the Agriprocessors’ plant in Postville with a search warrant, took some photographs and obtained samples of certain knives and cutting tools used by workers in the production process,” said Chaim Abrahams, a spokesman for Agriprocessors. “As it has done in the past, the company cooperated completely. No one was arrested, and there was no interference with production.”
Agriprocessors, the nation’s largest kosher meatpacking plant, was the location of one of the largest single-site immigration raids in American history on May 12. To date no members of upper management have faced charges in connection with the federal immigration raid. Two middle-management supervisors were charged with encouraging illegal immigration and have pleaded guilty in federal court. A third supervisor remains on the run.
Eyewitnesses in Postville report DCI agents left the plant with boxes and what was believed to be office electronics. The Attorney General’s Office would not confirm these reports.
The prepared statement from the Attorney General’s Office:
The Iowa Attorney General’s Office previously has acknowledged that at the request of the Allamakee County Attorney the AG’s Office is serving in the role of prosecutor in the enforcement of state laws in connection with investigations arising out of the May 12 activities at the Agriprocessors Postville facility. We are assisting the DCI and the Iowa State Division of Labor, which are the investigating agencies. That investigation is not yet complete.
In connection with that investigation, the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation and assisting agencies executed a search warrant Friday at the Agriprocessors facility in Postville. No one was arrested.
The execution of a search warrant is not a finding of guilt. We note as usual that any potential criminal charge is merely an accusation and any potential defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.
“As the Attorney General’s press release stated, no charges have been filed and the company, like everyone else in America, is to be ‘presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty,’” said Abrahams.
http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/84894/suspect-in-brooklyn-sexual-assaults-at-large/Default.aspx
Suspect In Brooklyn Sexual Assaults At Large
Police released on Tuesday the description of a suspect behind two abductions and rapes of underage children that took place in Borough Park, Brooklyn over a year.
On August 3, a 14-year-old Hasidic Jewish girl was forced into a four-door black sedan, driven to a secluded spot, sexually assaulted and then dropped off at another location.
Police see similarities with a July 2007 abduction of a four-year-old girl, who was then molested and dropped off 15 blocks from her home.
The neighborhood streets are filled with many mothers and children during the day, and residents expressed concern over the presence of a suspect.
“I just moved here, and so it’s a little scary,” said resident Tova Nassbaum. “I just got a job here, so I’m working here, so now I would probably think twice before I go out of the house myself at night.”
“I know the cops are out there, but they really have to be really, really out there,” said resident Linda Dominguez. “Find out who’s doing it, find out the people that’ve done it previously. They’re out, it’s summer, it’s hot. There’s parks, there’s schools. They have to be constantly in schoolyards, parks, all over.”
“It’s not a good thing. They should have police all over,” said resident Shaindel Lebowitz. “They have to catch him and let him be in jail for the rest of his life.”
Police describe the suspect as a man in his early 20s, with a thin build and short, black hair that is spiked up. He was seen wearing a black t-shirt and white sneakers.
The suspect was described as driving a black four-door sedan with tinted windows and a beige cloth interior.
On Tuesday, Democratic Brooklyn Assemblyman Dov Hikind offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the rapist’s conviction.
"I am deeply concerned about the two Borough Park abductions which have now been tied to the same assailant," said Hikind. "Already shaken by the recent assault, this will make residents even more anxious about the safety of our children. This is a community with a lot of children and they must be protected. The NYPD is to be commended for the significant resources they have committed to capturing this perpetrator.”
Anyone with information regarding the suspect should contact the Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS, or text CRIMES, then enter TIP577.
exposemolesters said...
ATTENTION:
I am seeking to validate some disturbing reports about a certain individual who was employed by
"Yeshiva Chofetz Chaim of Suffern NY" (this yeshiva no longer exists).
If you think you can help, please comment or contact me at:
matzil_nefoshos@yahoo.com
Your confidentiality is assured, and you will remain anonymous.
--------------------------------
A lot of stuff went on over here. Some boys were sexually getting it on with other boys and as a result were expelled.
I believe The (Rabbi) Zachs brothers were running the place, the older one being more in charge and not as friendly as the younger one.
This does not mean that I'm suggesting they are guilty of anything, because that I do not know.
However, since you mentioned that it was an employee, there is one that comes to mind. I do remember some rumblings about him. I think you are referring to the dorm counselor by the name of Yerachmiel.
From my understanding he was a person who engaged in voyeurism. While the boys would shower he would stand and watch between the cracks of the shower curtains. In some instances he even opened them completely.
Any woman who wants some friendly sexual advice from a Rabbi should consult with to me. I will even waive my fee for the first session. Please come with an extra pair of underwear as I will need to inspect the one you will be wearing.
-------------------------
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3578490,00.html
No longer a taboo: Bedroom affairs and marital problems are now open for discussion in the Orthodox sector. A newly launched course trains rabbis to engage in family and marital counseling and give advice on sex-related matters in order to help the religious sector deal with these rather sensitive issues
August 30, 2008
Disgusting letter betrays pain of sex abuse victims
Survivors of childhood sexual abuse – and I am one – do not wait decades for the opportunity to extort money from their molesters, as a recent letter writer suggested.
It takes courage to disclose the abuse, and time to heal from the betrayal.
To suggest that the individuals who have come forward deserve to be violated by “cellmates in Smyrna” is abhorrent, and I am disgusted that the News Journal would print this letter.
A victim of abuse experiences a breach of trust, and the repercussions of this loss of faith are profound. Offenders are usually known to their victims, and even a single experience can have a devastating effect on a child's developing sense of self.
Recovery is arduous; victims often blame themselves, and if their victimization has been a secret, the disclosure itself can be traumatic.
The impact of non-disclosure in adulthood is an inability to trust, which may interfere with interpersonal relationships. The psychological distresses experienced by victims of child sexual abuse include but are not limited to: post-traumatic stress disorder, disassociation, panic attacks, anxiety and depression.
Guilt and shame are universally experienced by victims, and affect personality development, self-esteem and personal identity.
I applaud those with the courage to reveal the abuse.
Kim Johnson
Wilmington
I do not always agree with SHMULEY BOTEACH, but this article is worth a read. Particularly, I wholeheartedly can relate to the financial burdens of a Jewish education for our children as he points out.
Sometimes I wonder if public school would have been the way to go. I am very frustrated and depleted financially due to the exuberant tuition fees and the general high cost of living a Jewish lifestyle.
Making Jewish life easier
Aug. 25, 2008
Shmuley Boteach , THE JERUSALEM POST
Last year I wrote a series of essays on the need to monitor the students who go to Israel for a year of study abroad. I noted that while few Jewish experiences are as inspiring as a year in Israel after high school, nevertheless, it shouldn't be a free-for-all: there is a need to steer some of the young people away from the nightlife on Jerusalem's Rehov Ben-Yehuda pedestrian mall and into social outlets that are more rewarding.
But as my second daughter prepares to go for her year next week, I only wish that my biggest worry was whether she would be monitored. Unfortunately, just days before she was due to depart, we received a message from the seminary where she was registered which informed us that due to financial constraints the school was closing. We are scrambling to find a replacement.
It's a strange and alarming predicament to be in (and if anyone out there has a suggestion for a quality alternative that still has room so late in the game, you know where to find me). It's made me ponder the enormous challenges that face Orthodox parents as they struggle to raise their kids. Is it really supposed to be this complicated?
FIRST, THERE is the enormous cost of tuition with which all of us struggle. It's not farfetched to say that approximately one-third of my income goes to paying for my kids to attend Jewish schools and universities. For a family with nine children, the burden is considerable and is made all the more difficult by America's punitive measure against parents of faith who want to give their children a values-based education. We pay high property taxes (we live in New Jersey which is the highest of all), but not one penny is allowed to subsidize even secular subjects like math at our kids' parochial schools.
Then, there is the cost of Jewish camps, Jewish after-school activities, bar and bat mitzvas, kosher food, religious celebrations and weddings. I'm not complaining. I wish the biggest problems in all of our lives were purely financial. But after a while, you begin to wonder how we are supposed to afford all of this.
And the challenges are not just monetary. In secular homes, life seems pretty straightforward. People usually have two to three kids max. They go to school around the corner, they finish high school, choose a university, graduate, get a job, date for about eight to 10 years and, after they have some money, settle down (hopefully) and get married.
In the Orthodox world it's much more complicated. Your kids often go to schools that are quite a hike from home, which involves logistical nightmares related to transportation. Suddenly, you're not only a chauffeur, but a management guru coordinating complicated carpool schedules. And you don't have two or three kids, you usually have five or six. Then, when your kids finish high school, it's not simply off to university. You have to help them find the right seminary or yeshiva in Israel first, with a whole new round of coordination challenges.
When they return and enter university, you are opposed to dating recreationally (as you should be). Your kids date to marry. And when they marry, young, they usually have nothing to start life with. So you have to help them get started, which is a pleasure, of course, but just adds more pressure to your existing burden.
And these series of complications do not even factor how, when you travel on a family vacation, you can't even eat at a restaurant. You have to bring pots and pans (which is why for many years we owned an RV, so we could bring a kitchen with us) and frozen bread and meat.
And we do this because we believe in it and because we see with our own eyes how, amid all these complications and colossal expenses, it removes from our lives far greater complications. Since our kids are raised with real values and divinely-inspired wisdom, they make healthier and more mature decisions in life that can usually translate into a more sturdy marriage, a more balanced and community-centered life, and a more spiritual and less materialistic existence.
LIKE MANY of you reading this article, I wouldn't change it for the world. I would not only die for my Judaism, I would even live for it. I will accept all these challenges and break my back to see my commitment through to my very last breath.
And even so, it should be easier. In our technologically-advanced world in which everything is being streamlined and communication has become effortless, leading a religious Jewish life should be just a little less complicated.
The fact that it is not is a testament to the lack of coordination among world Orthodoxy. If Jewish philanthropists can come together to offer a free trip to Israel to every Jewish young person, then surely we can make attending Jewish day schools more affordable and the availability of kosher food more widespread (which it is, to some extent, due to the miracle of organizations like the OU, but still not enough).
Here are a couple of suggestions.
1. Orthodox Jewry must team up with our Catholic and evangelical counterparts to put real pressure on our politicians to make subsidies for parochial schools a reality. Our tax dollars should be used to pay for our children's secular education in our private schools, which would pose no threat to the separation of church and state. It is our money after all and we're not asking them to pay for Bible studies.
2. A global fund must be created to give every Jewish child $5,000 per year toward tuition for a Jewish school or university.
3. Orthodox leaders should achieve a consensus on respectable weddings that do not spill over into the overly elaborate. Not only would this be a reflection of true Jewish values, it would help parents not feel obligated to mortgage their homes to keep up with the Schwartzes.
4. In California, which I am currently visiting, The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, a mainstream and highly successful franchise run by my friend Sonny Sassoon, has made its hundreds of branches entirely kosher. This means that you can find kosher cakes, sandwiches and bagels all over the West Coast. The American Jewish community should build on this model and create at least two national franchises, catering to the mainstream non-Jewish public, which are kosher so that Jewish families can eat wherever they travel.
None of this is impossible. Creating the State of Israel was a lot more difficult, and it came about because of one visionary Jew who said, "If you will it, it is no dream."
The writer is the international best-selling author of 20 books. His newest work, The Eros Effect, will be released by HarperCollins in January.
This article can also be read at http://www.jpost.com /servlet/Satellite?cid=1219572122807&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Don't try pinning this one on me. I was not involved in sending Sidney to California. A change of scenery might do one good, but my change of venue preference for a molester is Baltimore, the city that breeds!
-------------------------------
Before he was convicted and sent to prison in 1997 for sexually abusing a 12-year-old girl during bat mitzvah lessons, there had been numerous complaints against him. But each time allegations arose, he moved to a new community, leaving a trail of whispers and shattered lives.
September 1, 2008
Meatpacker in Brooklyn Challenges a Union Vote
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Agriprocessors, the Brooklyn-based company that is the nation’s largest kosher meat producer, is well known for the labor troubles at its meatpacking plant in Iowa — federal agents detained 389 of its workers as illegal immigrants in May, and labor officials in Iowa have accused it of employing 57 under-age workers.
But Agriprocessors is also having labor troubles closer to home, with the company asking the United States Supreme Court to overturn a vote to unionize at its distribution center along the Brooklyn waterfront.
If successful, the company’s appeal could have repercussions at companies across the country: it is trying to persuade the Supreme Court to rule that illegal immigrants do not have the right to join labor unions.
In September 2005, the company’s Brooklyn employees voted 15 to 5 to unionize, with one ballot challenged. The workers, most of them immigrants from Mexico, complained of low pay, not receiving time-and-a-half for overtime and not having health insurance or paid holidays.
“It was a dirty place to work, and they treated some of the workers real bad,” said Lucilo Brito, a former Agriprocessors truck driver.
Days after the vote, Agriprocessors stunned its employees by announcing that it would not recognize the union because, it said, it had just discovered that 17 of the workers were illegal immigrants.
The National Labor Relations Board nonetheless ordered Agriprocessors to recognize the union, Local 342 of the United Food and Commercial Workers, citing a 1984 Supreme Court ruling that affirmed the right of illegal immigrants to join unions.
Agriprocessors appealed the labor board’s order, with one of its lawyers, Richard Howard, telling the board, “This should not be a valid vote for representation” because “they’re not documented workers and not allowed to work.”
After Agriprocessors refused to deal with the union, 14 of the workers went on strike for seven weeks. The company responded by firing the strikers. (During the strike, union officials said, management hired day laborers from a nearby street corner, many of them illegal immigrants.)
The labor board continues to insist that Agriprocessors recognize the union. Lawyers for the board and union argue that it is foolish for the company to appeal the 1984 decision, in which the Supreme Court ruled that illegal immigrant workers fall within the definition of “employee” in the National Labor Relations Act and thus have the right to join unions...
Full Article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/01/nyregion/01union.html?_r=1&em=&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin
someone in the know,
Thank you for your insight. It is duly noted!
Take heed New York and follow suit. There are bundles of sex abuse cases waiting at your doorstep. Regrettably, they are trapped in the tentacles of a justice system that desperately needs a revamping.
One need only imagine the out pour of victims waiting for an amendment in the law that will provide them their day in court.
Their only fervent plea is for justice to prevail so that they can exhale!
=================================
http://www.in-forum.com/News/articles/213428
Decades-old abuse case heads to trial
Dave Olson
The Forum - 09/02/2008
A child sexual abuse trial set to start the week of Sept. 8 may be the first of its kind in Clay County.
The case involves two sisters, now in their 30s, who last year told police about sexual assaults they say Rodney Russell Trudeau subjected them to more than 20 years ago.
Despite the length of time that has passed, Trudeau may be tried on the allegations because of changes in law that started in the early 1980s, around the time the abuse is alleged to have occurred.
It was during that period the Minnesota Legislature began extending the statute of limitations for sex crimes.
The first step was giving prosecutors seven years from the time a crime occurs to file charges.
Not long after, the law was changed again, permitting prosecutors to bring charges in two ways:
One allows charges to be filed within nine years from the time a sexual assault occurs. If that deadline passes, prosecutors are permitted to bring charges within three years of when a sexual assault is reported, no matter how far in the past it occurred.
It’s possible the latter option has never been used in Clay County until now, according to Clay County Attorney Brian Melton.
“Obviously, there are difficulties in cases like that. We’re not going to have physical evidence and some of those things you like to have,” said Melton, who earlier this year brought charges of first-degree criminal sexual conduct against Trudeau, 54, who is also known as “Dusty.”
The case came to light when one of the women went to Moorhead police in October after disclosing the abuse to her therapist.
When contacted by an investigator, the woman’s sister confirmed her sibling’s accounts of extensive sexual abuse the women say went on for years.
It began, they said, when they were about 7 years old, after Trudeau, whom they knew as Dusty, befriended their family.
Despite the challenges of trying a decades-old case, Melton said it was necessary.
“It’s credible information, and it deserves to be prosecuted,” said Melton.
The time elements present challenges for the defense as well, said Brian Toay, one of Trudeau’s attorneys.
“These are some of the oldest facts I’ve ever had to deal with. I was 4 years old when this allegedly started,” said Toay.
After so much time, locating witnesses is not an easy job, he said.
“People can think back to 25 years ago, to the people you were with, it’s difficult to track people down who might be able to help you present a defense,” said Toay, adding he couldn’t speak in depth about the case.
“From the defense perspective, we need to see how the state’s evidence comes in,” he said.
Melton said the case is also unusual in that the alleged victims are children, but they will be testifying as adults.
“I think it’s very brave to come forward,” he said, adding that the easy thing for the women was to have done nothing.
“You’re going to get in front of a jury and discuss sexual activity, and that’s not easy for any person to do, much less have to talk about what happened to you as a child,” said Melton.
Readers can reach Forum reporter Dave Olson at (701) 241-5555
A MUST READ!
http://yudelstake.blogspot.com/2006/11/reb-shraga-feivel-mendelowitz-zl.html?showComment=1219026240000
TODAY IS THE YORTZAIT OF REB SHRAGE FEIVEL MENDELOWITZ, OB"M 3 ELLUL
Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Rabbi Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz (1886 - 7 September 1948) was an early leader of American Orthodoxy and founder of key institutions such as Torah Vodaath, a Yeshiva in Brooklyn, and Torah U'Mesorah, an outreach and educational organization. He is credited by many to have pioneered authentic Jewish education in the United States. His policies were often informed by Torah im Derech Eretz[1] . In the words of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein: "Were it not for him, there would be no Torah study and no Fear of Heaven at all in America."
Haredim move to eradicate 'foreign' pop
Sep. 2, 2008
Matthew Wagner , THE JERUSALEM POST
Musicians who use rock, rap, reggae and trance influences will not receive rabbinic approval for their CDs, nor will they be allowed to play in wedding halls under haredi kosher food supervision, according to a new, detailed list of guidelines drafted with rabbinical backing that differentiates between "kosher" and "treif" music.
The guidelines, which are still being formulated, also ban "2-4 beats and other rock and disco beats;" the "improper" use of electric bass, guitars and saxophones; and singing words from holy sources in a disrespectful, frivolous manner.
"Michael Jackson-style music has no place in our community," says Mordechai Bloi, a senior member of the Guardians of Sanctity and Education, an organization based in Bnei Brak that enforces what it sees as normative haredi behavior.
"We might be able to adopt Bach or Beethoven, music with class, but not goyishe African music and beats. We haredim want to protect ourselves from what we see as negative foreign influences. We are trying to maintain our own authentic music styles. We admit that times are changing, but we are trying to stay loyal to our roots."
This is the first time that specific, detailed criteria, including comments on playing styles, will be used to add transparency to the delineation between acceptable or "kosher" Jewish music and forbidden or "treif" music.
The man responsible for drafting the list is Rabbi Efraim Luft of Bnei Brak, who heads an organization called the Committee for Jewish Music. Luft works in conjunction with Bloi's organization and with the Jerusalem-based Council for the Purity of the Camp headed by Rabbi Yitzhak Meir Safronovitch. These are the two most important and influential "modesty patrols" in the haredi community.
Bloi and Safronovitch have managed over the years to consolidate their power by successfully courting the backing of the major halachic authorities. A large portion of the haredi community, which numbers between 500,000 and 700,000, is loyal to its rabbis.
Calls by rabbis to boycott a business, to take to the streets to demonstrate or to vote for a particular candidate are taken seriously.
Enforcers of modesty rules working with rabbinic support have harnessed the buying power of the haredi community to put pressure on bus companies, cellular phone operators and other firms. Egged, Dan, Superbus and other bus companies now offer haredi customers separate seating on buses for men and women; cellular telephone operators provide haredi clients with cellular telephones that have no access to Internet, SMS, "fancy" ring-tones or telephone numbers with sexual content; and companies such as El Al and Shefa Shuk, a grocery store chain, have suffered from boycotts after being accused of desecrating Shabbat.
Similarly, enforcers of haredi norms are monitoring, supervising and censoring the haredi pop music scene, with Luft spearheading the campaign. Luft has already issued a list of "kosher" and "non-kosher" bands and musicians. He said that dozens of yeshiva heads have agreed to refuse to come to the wedding of a student who hires a non-kosher band. Halls with haredi kashrut supervision who host non-kosher bands run the risk of losing their supervision, and hence their clientele. Companies that help promote haredi concerts expose themselves to the danger of a consumer boycott.
Luft said that music is just part of a much larger problem in haredi society.
"We see that the same people who are involved in the treif pop scene are also the ones in the unapproved news media, in the so-called religious radio stations, in film and in advertising," said Luft. "All of these things come together to demoralize haredi society and to lower the spiritual level of our youth.
"This is an issue that people over 30 understand very well what I am talking about and those under 30 have more difficulty understanding," Luft continued. "This music is pushing into our community a generation gap similar to one created by the rock music of the '50s in the US. The whole idea is that there are types of music that have no place with respectable people. Respectable people listen to decent music and immoral people list to indecent music, and it does not make sense that a community that has high moral standards should be listening to this type of music.
"The influence of music has a very profound effect on people in general. It has been proven that rock music has a very negative effect on people and on animals and plants, while classical music has a very positive effect."
Over the past several years haredi activists have enlisted almost all the major rabbinical authorities to stifle a burgeoning haredi pop music scene.
Last year, a letter forbidding all public music concerts, even when men and women in the audience are separated, was signed by a who's-who of Israeli rabbinical authorities.
The signatures of Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, the Gerrer Rebbe, Ya'acov Aryeh Alter, and even leading Sephardi halachic authority and Shas mentor Rabbi Ovadia Yosef all appeared on the letter, which was published specifically to torpedo a major haredi music concert that took place in Teddy Stadium in Jerusalem.
This summer, haredi activists banned a concert in Netanya that featured popular haredi singer Avraham Fried, who appeared together with secular performers. Despite the ban, there was a large turnout.
In addition to a few hundred haredim who showed up, Fried also attracted Chabad followers and the Religious Zionist crowd who do not acquiesce to mainstream haredi opinion on these matters. A large group of secular fans also came to see the secular performers.
Gad Elbaz, a young, upcoming haredi singer who is gaining popularity in non-haredi circles, held a concert similar to Fried's. Like Fried's Netanya concert, Elbaz's concert also took place far from a haredi center, in Caesarea. Like Fried, Elbaz appeared together with secular performers and was thus able to draw from a mixed crowd. In an original move, Elbaz's audience was split into three sections: women only, men only and mixed.
However, performers who do not appeal to a wider, non-haredi audience have been hurt by the rabbinic ban. For instance, Yaakov Shwekey's concert this summer in Kiryat Motzkin, near Haifa, was a failure. Instead of attracting a few thousand, Shwekey managed to draw an audience of just a few hundred.
Menahem Toker, a popular haredi DJ who was reportedly fired from Radio Kol Chai under pressure from haredi activists because he promoted "treif" shows, said that the blanket prohibition against all shows is doing more harm than good.
"Maybe a lot of people will listen to the rabbis and stop going to shows altogether," said Toker. "But there will be tens of thousands of people who, deprived of a kosher option, will end up going to mixed shows. And not just to frum, wholesome performers like Fried and Elbaz, but to secular performers also. So maybe in a way the anti-pop music activists have won a victory. But they also lost because they have not offered a kosher alternative."
Sources in the haredi music scene who spoke off the record for fear they would hurt their relationship with the rabbinic representatives said they doubted the rabbinic establishment would succeed in their newest crusade against CDs.
"What are they going to do listen to every single disc that is released? What about the thousands of discs that are already in the market?"
Luft admitted that listening to all the discs on the market would be a formidable challenge.
"The main aim is to focus on new songs before they get to the recording studio So far there have only been two cases in which discs have been banned by rabbis, said Luft.
One by controversial haredi vocalist Lipa Schmeltzer called Bli Ayan Hara" (Without the evil eye) and a Yiddish rap CD by David Kalish.
"There are certain types of music, such as rap and reggae, that are disgusting and have no place in our community."
This article can also be read at http://www.jpost.com /servlet/Satellite?cid=1220353263659&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
The message--------------
"Michael Jackson-style music? NO!
Rabbis molesting kids? YES!
Boycott a Yehivah or organization that harbors a child molester? NO!
Boycott bus companies, cellular phone operators, airlines, grocery stores? YES!
The solution--------------
Put these ban-crazy lunatic "Rabbis" on some deserted island far away from the bad ugly goyishe world.
There they can ban the fish, the water, and the coconuts, but at least they'll be far away from imposing their newest bans on everybody else.
www.chicagotribune.com/features/lifestyle/chi-0902-health-force_qsep02,0,4014089.story
chicagotribune.com
Spotlight on cancer genetics
By Judith Graham
Chicago Tribune reporter
September 2, 2008
In the high-profile world of breast cancer advocacy, women with a hereditary predisposition to the disease often feel overlooked.
That's why it meant so much when actress Christina Applegate acknowledged last month that she has a genetic mutation known as BRCA1 linked to breast and ovarian cancer.
Applegate, 36, went further, disclosing that she had had both breasts surgically removed. The actress' mother has battled cancer twice and "I just wanted to kind of be rid of it," she said on "Good Morning America."
At a distance, an online community of people with BRCA mutations buzzed with empathy and excitement. They're hosted by FORCE (Facing Our Risk of Cancer Empowered, facingourrisk.org), an organization devoted to people with the mutations."Christina, thank you so much," wrote "Meg" on the FORCE message board. "Not only will more women get tested and treated and lives will be saved … more people will have a better understanding of what we are going through."
"It's like she's a sister," said FORCE founder Sue Friedman of Tampa, who claims a mailing list of 8,000. She created the group in 1999, three years after being diagnosed with breast cancer at age 33. There was no history of breast cancer in her family.
Friedman recalled that nine months after her diagnosis, she casually picked up a magazine with an article on breast cancer and the BRCA mutation.The article described how women were at heightened risk for hereditary cancer if they'd suffered the illness in young adulthood, had other family members with breast, ovarian or pancreatic cancer, and were of Ashkenazi Jewish origins.
"I was like, oh my God, that's me," said Friedman, who's Jewish and whose father's mother had died of cancer, also at a young age.
The next thought was stunning. "Why didn't my doctors tell me?" Friedman said, remembering the experience. Since then, she says, she has spoken with many other women whose doctors did not tell them they were at risk.That's unfortunate. If a woman has the BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation, her lifetime risk of getting breast cancer jumps to between 36 percent and 85 percent, compared with a 13.2 percent lifetime risk for other women, according to the National Cancer Institute.
Overall, 5 percent to 10 percent of 192,000 American women who discover they have breast cancer each year have a hereditary version of the disease.
Women with BRCA mutations also have a much higher lifetime risk of getting ovarian cancer: 16 percent to 60 percent, compared with a 1.7 percent risk for other women, the Cancer Institute reports.
Taking charge
Inevitably, these women wonder if there's anything they can do to forestall cancer. The answer is yes: They can have their ovaries and breasts removed, preventively. But making this decision and living with the consequences is excruciating.
These women generally are younger than typical breast cancer patients, and many are thinking about getting pregnant. "What if I have children and pass the mutation on to them?" is a frequently expressed concern.
Some women feel the genetic mutation is a defect, a source of distress. "I felt there's something horribly wrong with me, even though no one can see it," said Sheila Saxe, 61, who lives outside Hartford, Conn., and learned she had the BRCA1 mutation two years ago.
Saxe's grandfather had four sisters; all died of ovarian cancer.
One of those sisters, Lillian Bernstein, passed away at 53. Her daughter Helen Goldberg died of breast cancer at 44, according to relatives. Goldberg's daughter, Risa Seiler, formerly of Glen Ellyn, succumbed to ovarian cancer in January 2007, almost 30 years after surviving breast cancer.
Soon after discovering she had ovarian cancer, Seiler had turned to her daughter Heather Fineman of Highland Park to help her do research on the Internet. As soon as they Googled breast and ovarian cancer, red flags began to appear.
Seiler had suffered both, she was an Ashkenazi Jew and there was extensive cancer history in the family.
But her doctors had never suggested she get a test for the BRCA mutation.
She did and discovered she was positive. Fineman had the test soon thereafter, learning she had the mutation too. Within six months, Fineman had her ovaries removed, a somewhat easier decision for her because she already had two young children and didn't have plans for more.
Getting tested
Both Fineman and FORCE's Friedman believe women should talk with their doctors if they're concerned about having this test. It's not warranted for all women who might be concerned about breast cancer, only for those with specific risk factors for the mutation.
In May 2007, at a FORCE conference in Florida, surrounded by women struggling with the same medical and emotional issues, Fineman and her sister Charlotte Seiler took the next step. Seiler, then 31, put aside her fear and decided to get tested for the BRCA1 mutation, which she didn't have. Fineman, then 36, went on to have both her breasts removed and surgically reconstructed in New York.
"It was time for me to do something proactive and not follow the same fate as the women in my family," she said. "And for that I thank my mom."
Judith Graham writes more on BRCA mutations Tuesday on her blog, Triage. Visit chicagotribune.com/triage.
jegraham@tribune.com
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