Epstein defense of torture/kidnapping: The husbands wanted to be forced!

Guest post: According to documents filed late last week, Epstein is apparently now claiming that he is innocent because he believed that the men consented to being kidnapped and beaten, and Stimmler is apparently now claiming -- based on an affidavit from Rabbi Breitowitz -- he can't be prosecuted because he was just following Jewish Law.

From a letter that Epstein's lawyer wrote to the judge:

Mendel Epstein believes that the victims of these alleged kidnappings consented, by virtue of their signing of the marriage ketubbah promising to be bound by the laws of Moses and Israel, both to the authority of the beth din and to the halakhic process of the “forced” get as the term is described by Maimonides. The argument is not that he was motivated by his desire to help agunahs escape their impossible position, and that this excuses his criminal conduct because this was a religious belief (although certainly he is entitled to present such evidence to rebut the Government’s assertion that he was motivated by the desire to obtain money), but that he lacked the intent to commit the crimes of kidnapping and conspiracy.

“[T]he Constitution guarantees criminal defendants a meaningful opportunity to present a complete defense.” Crane v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 683, 690 (1986) (internal quotation mark’s omitted). These defendants are thus entitled to present religious beliefs that are relevant to the issue of specific intent to commit the crimes of conspiracy and kidnapping and whether they believed that the victims consented to the compelled get, as factual determinations for a properly instructed jury. United States v. Hsia, 24 F. Supp. 2d at 43; United States v. Bertram, 477 F.2d 1329 1330 (10th Cir. 1973) (defendant’s testimony as to his religious beliefs, although not a defense to his criminal conduct, is admissible as “evidence of state of mind establishing that there was no criminal intent”). [...]

 The Government has already made the religious beliefs of the defendant’s part of this case, even if there were not a basis for their admission as to the issue of intent. Here, the Government relied on religious law to set up their sting operation to ensure that Rabbi Epstein would involve himself and others in convening the beth din for issuance of the required psak. They are presenting videos and recordings demonstrating the religious process itself. Yesterday morning their expert, ostensibly used to explain the dictionary definition of Talmudic terms, explained the get process, the religious beliefs underlyingthe obtaining of a get, and what was and was not permissible under Talmudic or rabbinical law, offering his opinion that the use of physical force is not permissible. Indeed, their expert testified about Dina D’malchusa Dina, a religious concept which is not found on any of the tapes or mentioned in any other evidence. The only possible reason the Government wanted it mentioned was so that the jury would draw the inference that defendants were not authorized to use force by Jewish law, and were in fact acting contrary to it.

From a letter from the U.S. Atttorney:

After agreeing with the Court that he “is not claiming a religious right to kidnap,” 1/28/15 Transcript (“Tr.”) at 57-58,1 defendant Stimler has abruptly changed course and now claims in his “renewed motion” to dismiss that he is raising precisely such a claim under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (“RFRA”). According to the supplementary declaration provided by Rabbi Breitowitz, Jewish law does permit the use of force to compel a recalcitrant husband to grant his wife a religious divorce under certain circumstances. Rabbi Breitowitz acknowledges that his initial declaration did not make that assertion, blaming the omission on defense counsel, who did not ask for such an assertion. Stimler does not argue in his renewed motion that the Court was incorrect in denying his original motion based on the information supplied to the Court. Rather, he contends that the additional information supplied by Rabbi Breitowitz should cause this Court to reverse itself. [...]

Given Stimler’s sandbagging tactics, the Government is in no position to dispute Rabbi Breitowitz’s assertions that at least some reputable Jewish legal authorities permit the use of physical violence to coerce a recalcitrant husband to grant a divorce, so long as the use of force is specifically authorized by a religious tribunal (beth din). See Supp.Decl. at ¶ ¶ 7, 8, and 9.2 The Indictment alleges that, before using physical violence to extract an agreement to divorce from a recalcitrant husband, defendants convened a beth din “which issued a contempt order, known as a ‘seruv,’ against the husband,” and that “[i]f the husband failed to respond, the beth din issued a ruling, known as a ‘psak din,’ authorizing the use of coercion and force to obtain the get.” Indictment, Count 1, ¶ 6.

Notably, however, Rabbi Breitowitz does not assert that Jewish law condones the use of violence to compel a recalcitrant husband to grant a Jewish divorce is permitted if, as the Indictment alleges here,3 the violence was perpetrated or defendants offered to perpetrate the violence in exchange for money. Stimler suggests that such might not be the case. Stimler Reply Brief, D.E. 188, 6 (“The Government may have a ‘compelling interest’ in prosecuting any individual who conspires to kidnap and possibly engage in violence for motives other than religious ones (such as obtaining ‘money or other things of value from agunot’)).” Certainly, an act performed altruistically to help a “chained woman” escape an oppressive marriage is very different from acting as a “hired gun,” and nothing in Rabbi Breitowitz’s supplementary declaration supports the notion that the latter is a mitvah, much less a religious obligation of Orthodox Jews.

Epstein Wolmark Torture Trial: Did the FBI get a phoney seruv from the Beis Din of America to entrap Epstein or is it a forgery?

There is a very interesting - and as far as I know - previously unaddressed  question in this  alleged torture for hire case.  The FBI agents playing the "wife" and "her brother" in setting up the sting operation told Epstein and Wolmark that the "wife" had a seruv from the Beis Din of America which they gave to Wolmark. This was one of the items that was seized by the FBI as noted in the complaint (below) by the defendants lawyer. The non-existent husband name was given as Alejandro Marconi.

 Where did the FBI get this seruv? There seem to be 3 alternatives 1) The seruv is a forgery by the FBI. 2) The Beis Din of America provided a phony seruv to the FBI to entrap the defendants. 3) The  Beis Din of America provided a seruv in what they thought was a genuine case - without talking to the husband. Anyone know which of the 3 alternatives is correct?

Epstein - Wolmark Divorce Torture Trial:Recording of FBI agents talking to Wolmark

NY Daily News



The Prodfather was referred to as a "special" rabbi who worked as a "hired hand" to help Jewish women obtain their religious divorces, a recording revealed Thursday.

The remark was made during a conversation between Rabbi Martin Wolmark, 56, and an undercover agent posing as a Jewish woman in desperate need of help to convince her husband to give her a religious divorce called a get.

Wolmark told her the woman the potential beatdown procedure could be "very costly" and that she needed the assistance of Rabbi Mendel Epstein. The woman was charged $60,000, according to prosecutors.

"You need special rabbis who are going to take this thing and see it through to the end," Wolmark, 56, said in the call played in federal court in New Jersey.

"It's a process," he added, noting a Jewish court would first have to authorize the group of rabbis to take action.

The undercover, who was joined by another agent pretending to be her brother, claimed her husband lived in Argentina but frequently traveled to New York.

"You need to get him to New York where someone can harass him or nail him," Wolmark told her.

In January, Wolmark pleaded guilty to conspiring to travel to New Jersey to force a man to give his wife a get. Five other codefendants in the case have also pleaded guilty.

Manny Waks: I'm the 'troublemaker' who blew the whistle on Jewish abuse scandal

The Guardian    When he was 18 years old, Manny Waks turned his back on life within the Judaism known as Chabad. But the effects on his life remain profound.

Orthodox sect of

Now 38, Waks is still unable to read a novel, so dictated was his childhood by religious texts. Until the age of about 29, he believed rubbing his eyes with his fingers after waking up in the morning would cause him to go blind unless he carried out a religious washing ceremony first.

But the most damage has been caused by the repeated sexual abuse he suffered within the umbrella organisation for the movement in Australia, known as Yeshivah. 

Waks grew up across the street from Melbourne’s Yeshivah Centre, where all of his schooling and extracurricular activities took place. He and his family were completely immersed within the Yeshivah community, and anything beyond its radius was foreign to them.

For the past fortnight, that secretive world has been comprehensively picked apart at the royal commission into institutional responses into child sexual abuse.[...]

The hearings represent the first time the Sydney and Melbourne Yeshivah centres, headquarters to the Orthodox Chabad sect of Judaism, have been scrutinised in public, and Waks’ evidence has played a central part in that process.[...]

It does not matter that peak Jewish bodies have publicly said the concept of mesirah does not, and should never, apply to cases of child sexual abuse. Even today, Waks says, victims remain fearful of being shunned.

“The fact that to this day I am the only victim who has been willing to be named should say plenty,” Waks says.

“It is easier for me than for other victims, because I am no longer in that world. Most child sex abuse victims prefer anonymity because of a range of taboos and stigmas attached to them. It’s very sensitive. 

“But within the Yeshivah community, those issues and barriers are multiplied tenfold, and by speaking out against them, your life will potentially be over. You will feel the consequences, you will be damaged goods.”[...]

Why does a divorce require the husband to give a Get and the wife to receive it?

   The Get and the Kesubah

Rabbis' absolute power: how sex abuse tore apart Australia's Orthodox Jewish community

The Guardian     Orthodox Judaism has never been exposed to such scrutiny. From a Melbourne courtroom, the torment of the Chabad rabbis was streamed live to the world as the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse probed the city’s secretive and powerful Yeshivah community.

Sharp divisions in the Jewish world have been exposed. Two rabbis, including one of the nation’s most prominent, have been forced from their posts. Whistleblowers, humiliated and ostracised for years by Yeshivah, have been dramatically vindicated. More victims have come forward. More criminal charges may follow. Yeshivah schools face a nightmare of civil litigation.

The cast is Jewish, yet the bones of this story are familiar to anyone who has followed the scandal of child abuse in Christian schools and parishes. Rabbis and bishops have shown over the years much the same failings when faced with a choice between guarding the prestige of their faiths and the safety of children. This story is about the dangers in any cult of blind obedience to holy men.[...]

Kramer had taught at the Yeshivah primary school in late 1989. The young American rabbi was immediately popular and immediately began molesting children. The number of his victims is not known, perhaps dozens, including two of the sons of Zephaniah Waks.

Waks was a most unwise man to cross. The Waks name is all through this story. Tenacity runs in the family. Half measures aren’t in their DNA. Their sense of right and wrong is strong and personal. As the father of 17 children, Zephaniah Waks had more than proved his dedication to Chabad. But in the end those children would mean more to him than any obligations to the sect.

Waks discovered the abuse in 1992. He says he complained to the principal of the Yeshivah school, Rabbi Abraham Glick. Within hours, Waks learned that Kramer had admitted the abuse. When he wasn’t fired, Waks says, he confronted Glick again, only to be told: “There is a danger of self-harm. So we can’t fire him.” [...]

Waks was outraged by the failure to act. He didn’t call the police because at this time he had no doubt that doing so “would be in breach of the Jewish principle of mesirah”. This ancient rule, still alive among the followers of many faiths including Judaism, threatens believers with expulsion if they take crimes within the faith to the civil authorities.

Waks called a meeting of parents hoping to pressure the school to sack Kramer. Hours before it was due to begin, he was told Kramer had been dismissed. What he did not discover until years later was that Groner had given Kramer an air ticket to Israel, on condition he leave Australia immediately.[...]

In 1996, Zephaniah Waks was appalled to discover another of his sons had been abused. Back from Israel for his sister’s wedding, Manny Waks had heard about Operation Paradox, the hotline for abuse victims run each year by Victoria police. In the history of combating abuse in many institutions and many faiths, Operation Paradox was to play an honoured role.

Manny told his father he had been abused for many years at Yeshivah, first by the son of a senior Chabad rabbi and then by Cyprys. He believes the abuse ruined his childhood. It was known in the playground, and he was mocked for being gay. He became wild and alienated from his schooling and his family. By the time of his Bar Mitzvah he had come to loathe the Chabad way of life. “I was lost,” he told the commission, “in the only world I knew.”

The police were called. Cyprys denied everything.

With the pluck so typical of his family, Manny confronted Groner in the street and told him of his abuse. “The conversation was a brief one,” he told the royal commission. “It seemed clear to me that Rabbi Groner was aware of the circumstances so there was very little I had to say. He said that Yeshivah was dealing with Cyprys and that I should not do anything of my own accord.”[...]

And Waks is still waiting for an apology from the peak Jewish bodies which did not stand up for him and the other victims. “They must apologise not just for the abuse, not just for the cover-ups. They left us out to dry.”

Another Chabad Rabbi - Daniel Walker - writes letter of support for Beth

update Friday 19th Another Chabad Rabbi - Bentzi Sudak - the CEO of Chabad in the UK:- wrote a letter of support   click link to see Rabbi Sudak's letter.

u

Man declared deadbeat for failing to pay child support for another man's child

KFOR     A child support case in Detroit gained national attention after the man proved he was not the father of the child in question.

Carnell Alexander says he was shocked when he was arrested during a traffic stop in the early 1990s.

The officer told Alexander that he was being arrested for being a deadbeat dad.

However, Alexander didn’t have any children.

The case started in the late eighties when Alexander’s ex-girlfriend had a child.

She said she needed help providing for the boy, but was told that in order to get welfare assistance, she had to name a father on the paperwork.

She said she decided to put down Alexander’s name, even though she knew he couldn’t be the father.

That’s when the state started a paternity case against him to collect money for the assistance that was provided.

A process-server turned in paperwork, claiming that Alexander was given notice of the case.

However, the Michigan Department of Corrections says that is impossible since he was incarcerated at the time. [...]

Barry Freundel pleads guilty to 52 counts of videotaping women in mikveh

Washington Post    Barry Freundel, a once-prominent D.C. Orthodox rabbi, admitted in court Thursday that he had secretly videotaped dozens of nude women as they prepared for a ritual bath.

In a hearing in D.C. Superior Court, Freundel pleaded guilty to 52 counts of voyeurism — one for each woman prosecutors identified who had been taped within the three-year statute of limitations.[...]

At a meeting at the U.S. Attorney’s Office last week, prosecutors said there may be as many as 150 women allegedly videotaped by the rabbi as they prepared for a private bath known as a mikvah, according to three people briefed on the investigation. [...]

Rav Sternbuch's comments about his opponents who tried to force him to change his halachic rulings

מסיבת הודאה

שר התורה מרן הגר"מ שטרנבוך שליט"א כינס במוצש"ק את מקורביו וערך מסיבת הודאה על כך שאנשים ידועים – ריקים ופוחזים משולי המחנה מדברים עליו סרה בדיבורי לשון הרע וכיו"ב, ומבקשים להטיל את מרותם על ידי הפעלת טרור.

תוכן הדרשה מצורף.Recording of the original Yiddish

בתוך כך יוזכר כי כבר מספר שבועות הבית הדין של העדה החרדית מושבת לחלוטין, ולא מתקיימים דיני תורה בבית הדין.

הסיבה היא שהראב"ד הגר"מ שטרנבוך שליט"א חדל מלהופיע בלשכת הבד"ץ כבר כמה שבועות, למרות שבפועל הינו עדיין ראב"ד העדה החרדית על כל המשתמע מכך, וחברי הנהלת העדה החרדית עומדים בקשר רציף עם מרן הראב"ד שליט"א על כל השאלות העומדות על סדר היום, (ובפרט בזמן האחרון, לאחר שהגאב"ד הגרי"ט וויס לקה במחלה קשה עד שכבר אין בכוחו להשיב דבר ה' זו הלכה כבשנים קדמוניות), אבל בעקבות "שיבושי הליכי דין" שבוצעו בדיונים על מתחם "שנלר", אין המצב מאפשר השתתפות של מרן הראב"ד שליט"א יחד עם שאר חברי הבד"ץ עד שיסודרו העניינים בהסכמים (פנימיים) ברורים. 

Allan Katz: Setting Limits - Restrictions or Guidelines

Allan Katz    Parashat Terumah deals with God's instructions to build a Tabernacle- mishkan –to be  a resting place for God's presence. The most important component of the mishkan was the Ark of the Covenant – ארון הברית which housed the tablets – לוחות העדות a testimony to God's revelation. After the revelation at Mount Sinai, God would continue to communicate with Moshe and teach him the Torah in the mishkan =the tabernacle or also called  'tent of meeting' – אוהל מועד.

Moshe stood before the Ark,its covering and the keruvim, from between which God spoke to him.

The Ark-aron itself was made from 'acacia wood '- עצי שיטים. The inner box was made from wood and 2 other boxes in a sense covered or plated the inner box with gold, one from the inside and the other from the outside. The wood symbolizes the dynamic, flexible and living nature of the Torah which is made possible through the Sages- חכמים   and their application of the ' Oral Law' – תורה שבעל פה. The gold plating symbolizes the Torah and God's immutable and unchanging spiritual laws and methodology. At Mount Sinai, God gave the Sages the power to create Halacha- a legal system using God's immutable spiritual laws, principles and methodology. The Halacha governs every aspect of life and has the dynamism to adapt to changing times and situations without losing any of its authenticity and deviating from Torah's principles. It is because the Torah is not in heaven- לא בשמים היא   ,  the Sages have the power to create Halacha and we must follow them "ועשית ככל אשר יורך- לא תסור מכל אשר יורך " that the Torah has been able to adapt to changes and new situations and  yet remain authentic.

The way the Sages derive the Halacha- law from the situation and Torah principles gives us an insight how we should set limits or more important how we help kids set their own limits.

Setting limits and boundaries is an important part of parenting. However the way we set limits can impact negatively on the moral development of children, restrict them and thwart their autonomy and set off challenging behavior and the resistance of kids with difficulties. Limit setting should be used to create structure. It should not be used to restrict kids and make them feel controlled. One does not have to be controlling to create structure, and it is structure with its limits that offers kids more freedom.

The question - Thomas Gordon, the author of P.E.T – Parent Effectiveness Training says is not whether limits and boundaries are necessary but the question is who sets them? Is it parents unilaterally imposing limits on their children or are parents and kids working together to figure out what makes sense. When we 'work together' with children and collaboratively solve problems by addressing both our concerns and the kids concerns, and then brainstorming a mutual satisfying solution we have actually set a limit. When parents concerns are being addressed by the solution, we have set a limit in a collaborative way.

When we talk about limits and boundaries in general , the question then becomes what kinds of limits and boundaries are we talking about - how specific or behavioral should they be – are we talking about  boundaries and limits as opposed to broadly conceived guidelines that can inform a lot of our activities for eg  - a limit on not hurting other people, addressing the needs of others, being empathic, kind and respectful etc .Don't we want kids to derive limits and guidelines on how to act from the situation itself and what other people need ? If so, then our coming up with limits, and especially specific behavioral limits and imposing them on kids makes it less likely that kids will become moral people who say that the situation decrees a kind of a boundary for appropriate ways to act and I will be guided by that my whole life, An example would be the different thinking a kid would have when faced with a bowl of cookies and would love to eat all of them because ' I am hungry and I love cookies '. When the parent imposes a limit – ' You can take only one cookie ' = I cannot take more because mom said I can have only one or else, or where the kid thinks,' I would love to eat all the cookies but there are others kids around too and they are also hungry so I will make sure that everyone has cookies too.' In some situations the kid will offer friends and go without a cookie. When parents say ' you must share because I said so' and follow up with a patronizing pat on the head ' good sharing ', the wrong message gets internalized. I am sharing because mom says so and because I will get a verbal reward for sharing. And when kids refrain from doing something, we want them to ask if doing X is wrong and   how will doing X impact on the other kids and not ask - am I allowed to do X and what will happen to me if I do X.? The limits on kid's behavior, in other words, should be experienced as intrinsic to the situation.

The Torah gives us guidelines by which we can give purpose and direction to our lives. They will guide and inform our behavior helping us and our children to derive the limit from the situation itself, so that limits are experienced intrinsic to the situation.

We want to reframe the concepts of limits, not as restrictions, limits or boundaries that adults impose on kids, but our children acting in a moral way by deriving the limit from the situation itself, so that limits are experienced intrinsic to the situation.