A son-in-law of Sholom Rubashkin, the kosher meat mogul convicted of financial fraud in November, has pleaded guilty to child endangerment in a case related to the sexual molestation of a 13-year-old boy at a mikveh. Under a plea bargain agreement, he faces up to 60 days in jail.
Under oath, Rabbi Yaakov Weiss admitted to: “While naked, knowingly having inappropriate physical contact with a child, who was also naked at the time,” according to the prosecutor in the case. On January 11, Weiss pleaded guilty in an Albany, N.Y, court to endangering the welfare of a child.
Under the plea bargain, Weiss will not be required to be listed in a registry of sex offenders.
Prosecutors said they agreed to the deal to spare the boy and another child victim from the rigors of testifying at trial.
“This case has subjected these boys to an enormous amount of community pressure,” said Shannon Sarfoh, bureau chief of the Special Victims Unit of the Albany County district attorney’s office.
The mother of one of the two 13-year-old boys told The Forward, “We’re pleased that it’s over and glad that the children didn’t have to be subjected to testifying.” The Forward’s policy is not to name children or their families in such cases.
Weiss, 29, established a Chabad center in Colonie, an Albany suburb, and an affiliated Chabad Hebrew School. Indicted August 25, he served as an emissary of the Chabad movement until a few months ago. Weiss was suspended by Chabad, as soon as the charges were filed.
Weiss was charged with four counts related to sexual molestation of the two boys. Weiss pleaded guilty to child endangerment, but under the terms of his plea bargain, he admitted his guilt to other counts in the indictment under oath in court, Sarfoh said.
He pleaded guilty to advising one of the boys, in a phone call, to lie to his mother and to police about what had occurred.
The maximum jail sentence for the child endangerment charge is 60 days. A March 1 sentencing hearing was scheduled. As part of the plea bargain, Weiss will also be on probation for three years and will be evaluated by a psychologist.
If he had been convicted of all four counts with which he was originally charged, Weiss faced up to two years in jail.
“He got a slap on the hand. Across the country people are copping pleas so they don’t end up on sex offender registries,” said Vicki Polin, founder and chief executive officer of The Awareness Center, which advocates on behalf of victims of rabbinic sexual abuse.
“Our courts seem to care more about white-collar crime than they do about our own children,” she said. “If he’s not on a sex offender registry, it means he still can teach. There are so many cases just like this and then they just re-offend.”
In June 2007, Weiss gave a ride to one of the 13-year-old boys, who is the son of another Lubavitch rabbi in the area. They drove to the local mikveh, which is on the grounds of the Albany Jewish Community Center.
It wasn’t unusual for her son to get a ride to the mikveh with the rabbi, the boy’s mother told the Forward. Some Lubavitch men have a custom of immersing daily in the ritual bath that they regard as spiritually purifying. According to court documents, her son looked to Weiss as “a rabbi, teacher and spiritual advisor.”
At the mikveh, Weiss “touched his penis to the boy’s buttocks,” states the indictment. It charges that Weiss did the same with the other boy.
Weiss and his wife, Roza, settled in Colonie six years ago. They have three young daughters.
Roza is the eldest daughter of Sholom Rubashkin, who now sits in an Iowa prison awaiting sentencing stemming from his conviction on 86 counts of bank and wire fraud. He was a senior executive at his family’s company, Agriprocessors, formerly the country’s largest kosher meat producer. Immigration officials who raided the plant in May 2008 found illegal immigrants employed there and arrested 389 people. The firm subsequently filed for bankruptcy and was sold.
The Rubashkins are a prominent family in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. The night before her husband’s plea, Roza Weiss appeared at a Crown Heights fundraiser to raise money for her father’s defense fund so he can appeal his case.
Reached on his wife’s cell phone on January 11, after his court appearance, Weiss softly told a reporter that he had no comment.
His lawyer, however, had plenty to say.
Even after his client admitted guilt in court, said Arnold Proskin, “He molested nobody.”
The entire case, he said, is rooted in a Chabad turf war between another area Chabad emissary and Weiss.
“It’s a political Orthodox Jewish game,” said Proskin. “The father of one of these boys is head of Chabad in a neighboring town and wants Colonie very, very bad. He’s jealous of him. In my mind, there’s not a doubt that this is what this about.”
If Weiss returns to teaching local Hebrew school classes, the mother interviewed by the Forward said it wouldn’t bother her.
“We’re just going to rise above it. I have no personal vendetta,” she said. “I wanted to protect my child and other children. I think it’s going to be good enough to do that, and hope it will also turn the tide a little bit so people don’t feel they can operate with impunity.”
Contact Debra Nussbaum Cohen at dnussbaumc@forward.com
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Lawyer Proskin's statements are demonstrably false and a very bad joke. Its comments like his that give the lawyering profession a bad name. As for his client, if the charges were "100% untrue", as he claimed, then he would have fought the charges at trial instead of copping a plea.
Evidently, this trip to the mikveh wasn't all that spiritually purifying for Weiss. A whitewashed sepulcher on the outside with dead man's bones on the inside.
Evidently, this trip to the mikveh wasn't all that spiritually purifying for Weiss. A whitewashed sepulcher on the outside with dead man's bones on the inside.
Lawyer Proskin's statements are demonstrably false and a very bad joke. Its comments like his that give the lawyering profession a bad name. As for his client, if the charges were "100% untrue", as he claimed, then he would have fought the charges at trial instead of copping a plea.
The fact that the Rabbi Pled Guilty to the Crime and the lawyer stated the Rabbi didn't commit the crime shows the Lawyer is suborning Perjury. This incident is a true Chillul Hashem.
Even though the Rabbi got a "slap on the wrist" from the civil courts he will get much more from Hashem's Court.
Hashem will deal with the Lawyer too. This incident disgusts me. A True Chillul Hashem!
Evidently, "copping a plea" was not all that he "copped."
Not funny, Yitzchok. And uncalled-for.
"The fact that the Rabbi Pled Guilty to the Crime and the lawyer stated the Rabbi didn't commit the crime shows the Lawyer is suborning Perjury. This incident is a true Chillul Hashem."
True enough, Moshe. But this rabbi essentially getting away with this crime and continuing to teach children as a role model is Chillul Chabad, Chillul all rabbis, Chillul Judaism, Chillul the Jewish court system, Chillul America, and Chillul Planet Earth.
"Even though the Rabbi got a "slap on the wrist" from the civil courts he will get much more from Hashem's Court. Hashem will deal with the Lawyer too."
While you wait around for Hashem, we here on Earth still have to deal with this man (and the people who defend him) for the next 40 years. What will YOU do to help
?
Eliezer, I hope you're not defending this guy, because he should rightly be in jail. He abused his position and preyed on an innocent, trusting thirteen year old. He should not be allowed in a teaching position any time soon. His shlichus and smichah should be revoked. He should rightly be in jail. He's very fortunate that he "copped a plea deal." this is nothing less than a travesty of the justice system.
OK---you have made your point. You despise Orthodox Jews, and will go to any extreme to defame ALL observant Jews, to make your fellow lesbian and gay "Jews" seem acceptable. You will also do whatever it takes to cleanse the FILTHY nature of your chosen one---Buraq Hussein Soros Obama.
When a Deformed Rabbi in my area had his wife MURDERED, did you condemn all Deformed Jews? When a Deformed Rabbi in my area also was arrested on kiddie porn chagres, did you mention that? ANSWER: NO!
Obviously, if the young man in the article did commit the crime mentioned, he is UN-religious and a disgrace. I doubt that your focus on BAD within Orthodox, but silence when it comes to Deformed and Deconstructed Jews speaks louder than 1,000 copies of your rag.
BTW, if the guilty plea acknowledges that the complained of acts REALLY did take place, the ACTIONS to which the man plead guilty involved HOMOSEXUAL conduct between two men---also prohibited by Torah.
Is the homosexual conduct also wrong?
Yes, the crime and the homosexual conduct are DISGUSTING, SINFUL, and TO BE CONDEMNED BY REAL JEWS and HASHEM
First an obnoxious and uncalled-for "joke", Yitzchok. And now a 180-degree misreading of my post. That's can't have been easy to do, as I express myself very clearly.
Perhaps you are unaware that quotation marks enclose a quoted quotation. Perhaps you do not know what the word Chillul means. I don't know.
Perhaps, if you have nothing to say, you should say nothing. Kapeesh?
**********
@Hymie. Who is this "ÿou" that you are rattling on about?
I am so tired of all these molesters who bargain fantastically lenient plea bargains and then turn around and say I am not really guilty. I can live with the the two month sentence, but no sex registry! There are no warning signs for others, no way of easily finding out he is in your neighborhood.
I suspect chabad leaned on the complainants to maneuver the DA to settle for a lenient plea deal! I hope chabad does not let him teach again. He is not a man to be trusted with children.
The entire Rubashkin family is loaded with criminals, y do the Lubav's support them with collecting money for thier defense..