Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Rabbi Barry Freundel Appeals Prison Sentence for Mikveh-Peeping

Rabbi Barry Freundel is appealing the length of his prison sentence for filming women nude at a ritual bath.

Freundel, who was sentenced in May to 6 1/2 years for videotaping dozens of women at a Washington, D.C., mikveh, is arguing that he should have been sentenced to no more than one year in prison, the Washington Post reported Friday.

A hearing on the appeal will be held in Washington Superior Court on July 31.

Freundel, 63, was given 45 days for each of the 52 counts of misdemeanor voyeurism for the videotaping that took place between 2012 and 2014. He will serve the sentences successively.

His attorney is arguing that the rabbi should not have been sentenced separately for each of his victims and instead only for one act of videotaping, the Post reported.

Freundel is being held in isolation in a Washington jail after prison officials received threats against him.

The rabbi also recorded an additional 100 women beginning in April 2009 who were not part of the criminal complaint due to the statute of limitations.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.