[IC10021]

Brooklyn rabbis arrested for allegedly torturing men into divorcing their wives (photos below)

The Brooklyn rabbis who were allegedly assembling a crew to kidnap and torture a husband into divorcing his wife were investigated in the '90s for similar crimes but they were not charged.

BY RICH SCHAPIRO AND OREN YANIV / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 12, 2013, 12:06 AM

FBI agents remove evidence from Brooklyn home of Rabbi Mendel Epstein (r.) on Thursday.

(SEE BELOW: Photo by AP
JOHN MINCHILLO/AP
FBI agents remove evidence from the Brooklyn home of Rabbi Mendel Epstein on Thursday. The Brooklyn rabbis who were busted for allegedly assembling a crew of henchmen to kidnap and torture a husband into divorcing his wife were investigated for similar allegations in the late 1990s.)

The Brooklyn rabbis busted by the feds for allegedly assembling a crew of henchmen to kidnap and torture a husband into granting his wife a divorce were investigated for similar allegations in the late 1990s, but no charges were filed, the Daily News has learned.

Rabbi Abraham Rubin filed a civil racketeering lawsuit in 1997 claiming Rabbi Mendel Epstein and his kidnap crew tortured him, beating him and shocking his genitals with an electric stun gun, in an attempt to force him to give his wife a divorce, or “get” in Jewish law, Newsday reported at the time.

That lawsuit was dropped in 2000, records show, and the Brooklyn District Attorney declined to press criminal charges because Rubin “was unable to identify any of the defendants,” a spokesperson told the Daily News.


(SEE PHOTO BELOW: Rabbi Mendel Epstein being interviewed in the documentary 'Women Unchained.')

Dr. Monty Weinstein, who works in family therapy, said he’s heard stories about Epstein’s non-kosher tactics over the past few decades, but that his complaints always fell on deaf ears.

“What bothered me is that the police and courts didn’t care,” said Weinstein.

Federal prosecutors who brought charges against Epstein, 68, on Thursday said they have the Brooklyn rabbi on tape bragging he has forced “gets” every year or so for some 30 years, even zapping hardheaded husbands with a cattle prod if they relented.


Federal prosecutors who brought charges against Epstein say they have the Brooklyn rabbi on tape bragging about forcing divorces, or 'gets,' every year or so for 30 years.

(SEE PHOTO BY JOHN MINCHILLO/AP BELOW. Caption: Here, FBI agents leave the Brooklyn residence of Epstein during an investigation on Thursday.)


Federal prosecutors who brought charges against Epstein say they have the Brooklyn rabbi on tape bragging about forcing divorces, or 'gets,' every year or so for 30 years. Here, FBI agents leave the Brooklyn residence of Epstein during an investigation on Thursday.

Rabbi Martin Wolmark, 55, of Monsey, Rockland County, who was also named in the 1997 lawsuit, and eight others were part of the shocking takedown that elicited defenders from their insular Orthodox community.

“When no one could get ladies freed from their husbands, they came to him,” said Sam Grossman, 71, who lives down the block from the Rubin’s Kensington home.

Two of the accused henchmen volunteered at Our Place, an organization that assists at-risk Jewish youngsters, said director Sony Perlman.

(SEE PHOTO BY JOHN MINCHILLO/AP, BELOW. CAPTION:
An FBI agent stands guard as evidence sits in the trunk of a vehicle at Epstein's Brooklyn residence on Thursday.)

Defendant Simcha Bulmash would donate his time giving free guitar lessons and Moses Goldstein ran fitness classes. Perlman also used to refer people to Binyamin Stimler, a therapist.

“If this is true, I’m surprised,” said Perlman, an organization that assists at-risk Jewish youngsters, who worked with three of the accused. “They devote their lives to helping people.”

They are among the eight men arrested while lying in wait at a New Jersey warehouse, allegedly armed with rope, surgical blades, a screwdriver and plastic bags.

One man was wearing a garbage bag over his clothing as they discussed their unholy plan “to grab the husband, pull him down, tie him up and take his phone,” court papers say.

The crew charged $60,000 for their muscle from a desperate woman who said her marriage was broken — but she was actually and undercover agent.



Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/...#ixzz2hZ6GqjFC

[winvens]

Scumbuckets...this makes so ashamed to be a convert. There's enough anti-Semitism in the world, idiots like these just add fuel to the fire.

[Pyramid_Head]

Big shocker; more religious nuts.

[Megamel29]

This is crazy. Imagine this being done to women to get a divorce. So this isn't about money? Because the fee seems high. Does being Jewish complicate the issue of divorce any more than any other religion?

[IC10021]

LETTER
Divorce for Jewish Women
Published: October 18, 2013
New York Times

To the Editor:

The scandalous situation of kidnapping and torturing recalcitrant husbands who withhold a Jewish divorce, a “get,” from their wives is a result of the Orthodox rabbinate’s failure to use the compassionate and creative solutions long available under Jewish law to free women from dead marriages (“U.S. Accuses 2 Rabbis of Kidnapping Husbands for a Fee,” news article, Oct. 11).

Pious agunot, women desperate to be free of their husbands, many of whom are violent, criminals or pedophiles, are vulnerable to corrupt rabbis who tell them that yielding to extortion or torturing their husbands is the only way they can ever be free to remarry and raise a family.

Opportunistic thugs, sometimes mythologized as heroes, run amok because mainstream Orthodox rabbis insist that even violent and degenerate husbands retain control over their wives. Every rabbi who fails to use the peaceful avenues available under Jewish law to free agunot opens the way for this shocking disgrace of the Jewish community.

SUSAN ARANOFF
RIVKA HAUT
Brooklyn, Oct. 11, 2013


The writers are co-authors of the forthcoming book “The Agunah Chronicles,” a nonfiction account of helping agunot struggle for freedom in rabbinical courts in the United States.