Top Doc Scared Off Panel On Rabbinic Sex MolestersTapped by Hikind, Twerski cites threats; pol ready to ‘name names’ of alleged abusers.
by Hella Winston A prominent Orthodox rabbi and psychologist has been intimidated into quitting as head of a just-formed task force dealing with rabbinic sex abuse of minors, organized by Assemblyman Dov Hikind this week.
“To protect myself, my family, and reputation, I decided
to withdraw from this project,” he wrote in an e-mail as the
paper was going to press with a story announcing Hikind’s
formation of the task force. “From this point, I am avoiding
participation in any forms of public service. Public life is
not for me.” Hikind, a Brooklyn Democrat who represents Borough Park
and Flatbush, deplored Twerski’s abrupt departure from his
new panel. “He was basically forced to resign,” said Hikind. “He was
literally put against the wall, and he felt he had no
choice. We’ll get somebody else who’s very respected. But
that’s not the point. The point is they got to him, they
threatened him.” Twerski’s dramatic departure came just as Hikind was
rolling out the new panel, planned as the next step in a
personal crusade against child sex abuse in the Orthodox
community that he has come to view as an epidemic. Hikind said he had amassed a dossier with the cases of
“hundreds” of individuals who say they have been sexually
molested by rabbis and other Orthodox community members
during their childhood. And he threatened to broadcast the
names of their abusers if community leaders do not respond
to his call for action against them. “Let me tell you,” he said in an interview last week,
“when there’s a person who we have confirmed through a
variety of people has been doing terrible things” and those
who know refuse to go to the authorities, “I am prepared to
name names. I am prepared to be sued by those pedophiles. If
they’re innocent, let them sue me.” Speaking after a rash of highly publicized sexual
molestation cases in the Orthodox community, Hikind said, “I
have been learning that a lot of people out there know who
the bad guys are. Where have I been? How come no one talked
to me, how come no one came to me?” Now, Hikind says, he is more determined than ever to
establish a community task force to address the issue.
Though vague on the panel’s broader makeup and specific
plans, Hikind ultimately seeks to develop a list of sexual
molesters in Orthodox schools to keep them away from
children. Neither man would specify the nature of the threats made
against Twerski to force his departure. But Hikind called
them “pathetic and sad.” “My heart goes out to him,” he said. “I don’t know if I
should laugh or cry. Things are opening up, people are
coming forward, but we are still so far away.” Hikind’s new crusade follows several cases in which
individuals — often adults now — have gone public with
accounts of sexual abuse they experienced at the hands of
respected yeshiva teachers when they were children. The
alleged victims have spoken, too, of the rejection or even
intimidation they experienced from their yeshivas and
rabbinic leaders when they tried to report what had happened
to them. In one of the few cases in which victims went to the
secular court system, Rabbi Yehuda Kolko of Yeshiva Torah
Temimah in Flatbush was convicted on two counts of child
endangerment last April. Another alleged abuser, Rabbi
Avrohom Mondrowitz, now awaits extradition from Israel to
Brooklyn, where he has been charged with sexual abuse of
children. More recently Joel Engelman, a former student at the
Satmar chasidic sect’s United Talmudical Academy in
Williamsburg, has alleged he was abused when he eight years
old by Rabbi Avrohom Reichman. Engelman, now 23, has filed
suit against Rabbi Reichman and UTA, which, he says,
violated its promise to him to dismiss Rabbi Reichman in
exchange for his not going public. UTA has yet to respond to
the suit. Hikind, who began broadcasting radio shows addressing the
issue bluntly about a month ago said, “For a couple of weeks
now, so many people have been coming forward. It’s made me
absolutely sick, to have to listen to this, to be so
shocked, to see so much pain, so much suffering. ... I
actually feel that [this] may be the most important thing
I’ve done in 26 years. Because you’re talking about saving
lives.” At times during his interview, Hikind sounded vague when
pressed on just what his task force would do and how it
proposed to go about doing it. The panel will present its
findings to “leading rabbis” in various Orthodox
communities, he said. And the rabbis, he predicted, “will be
absolutely flabbergasted” by what they hear. His ultimate goal, said Hikind, is to establish a
communal registry that would list the names of teachers
removed from schools due to abusive behavior. “We need to develop a system, a roster, a protocol needs
to be developed,” he said. “If you have a pedophile who is
teaching in a yeshiva, that person needs to be on a list,
and before any other yeshiva hires a person, you need to be
able to go to a roster and see if that rebbe was teaching
somewhere else and got thrown out.” But at another point, apparently recognizing that many
schools are often reluctant to dismiss such teachers in the
first place, Hikind appeared to envision a more ambitious,
quasi-judicial function for his panel. “It’s sort of hard to investigate yourself,” Hikind
admitted. “There’s got to be a system where trusted people,
respected leaders, who are not directly a part of that
particular organization examine everything. Look, I wasn’t
there when these boys were abused, nor was anyone else. So
we have to make judgments. We do that all the time.” The father of one child allegedly abused by Rabbi Kolko,
who spoke on condition of anonymity, derided the notion of
the community policing itself, citing his own unsuccessful
efforts to marshal rabbinic action in his son’s case. “I commend Dov for what he is doing,” said the father of
the 10-year-old boy, who was allegedly molested in first
grade, “but all these rabbis will make a farce of it. It
touches their business. All these schools are somehow
connected together.” Another long-time community activist, who spoke to The
Jewish Week on condition of anonymity due to the
controversial nature of the issue, said, “Dov’s actions of
these past few months are moving to anyone who cares about
this issue. Yet we are very concerned that he has set back
the cause by offering community members an alternative to
the secular authorities. Reporting the abusers to the rabbis is “akin to asking
the fox to watch the henhouse,” this source said. “We spent
close to three decades reporting abusers to their yeshiva
employers, local rabbis and ‘gedolim’ only to watch time and
time again as the information we provided was used to
protect the abusers and vilify the victims. “There is a functioning system in place that we will
never have the resources or expertise to replicate, “ he
continued, referring to the secular authorities. “Indeed, to
suggest that we are doing so is to do a grave injustice. If
people believe we have an alternative to the police, which
we do not and never will have, they will rely upon this
belief and nothing will change. We tried this and came to
the painful conclusion that it can not work.” Hikind himself took a nuanced position on the issue of
going to outside authorities. “Look, I would like to see people report to the police,” he said. “But there are some realities in our communities. ... People in our community, as you know, don’t want to go public. They want to keep it quiet, which is terrible. It’s sinful. I use the word sinful because for someone not to come forward in a situation of abuse of their child is not only to be guilty for not pressing issues for their own child, but they are guilty for every other child that is abused after their child. And they have to live with that. I keep on repeating that to everyone.”
Under current law, the state cannot pursue criminal
prosecutions of an alleged molester once the alleged victim
turns 23. A victim himself must bring a civil suit against
his molester or against the school he alleges failed to
protect him by between one and six years after his 18th
birthday, depending on the nature of the allegation. But child victims of sexual abuse often do not understand
or come to terms with their experiences — or sometimes, even
recall them — until years, or even decades after they take
place. Members of the Orthodox community have the additional
burden of overcoming their peer group’s hostility to turning
to secular authorities on such a sensitive matter. By then,
the statute of limitations often bars their entry to the
courtroom. There are currently several bills in the state
Legislature to address this problem, though none have passed
in the Senate yet. A bill to extend the statute of
limitations and open a one-year window for victims to seek
damages regardless of their age recently passed in the
Assembly but has repeatedly stalled in the Senate. “The statute of limitations needs to be extended,” said
Hikind. “I’m totally for that . . . I will do everything in
the world to make that happen because now I realize how
critical that is.” New York — unlike 25 other states — does not now
classify clergy as mandated reporters, which means that they
are not required to report evidence of sex abuse or violence
to state child welfare authorities. Legislation requiring fingerprinting and background
checks for prospective non-public school faculty was
defeated in the Assembly last year but reintroduced this
year by Republican Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos. The
legislation does not, however, have the support of Assembly
Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Lower East Side). Agudath Israel, an umbrella group of ultra-traditional
Orthodox organizations, is opposed to both the mandated
reporting and finger printing, and background check
legislation. [Parochial schools] are near-totally unsupervised by the
state, which is a throwback to pre-16th century English
common law when the church could give sanctuary [to
fugitives]. This has to change.” Hikind would not commit yet on such specifics. “I am
sitting with my legislative person right now. We are just
going to start our conversation. It’s sort of a new look for
me at everything,” he said.” But he added: “Anything that contributes to apprehending
the bad guy and helping the victims, we need to do — period,
end of the story. That’s my position. I have a new
perspective because I’ve taken a close look, because I’ve
spent almost four weeks now listening non-stop to horror
stories, and then I’m told by people today who met with me,
‘Dov, it’s worse than even you think right now.’ I said,
‘what?’” |
New York - Agudath Israel: We Strongly Support Bill Requiring Employee Background Check In Yeshivas, Reports To The Contrary False
Published on: 09-13-08 at 08:50 PM
“Agudath Israel, an umbrella group of ultra-traditional Orthodox organizations, is opposed to both the mandated reporting and finger printing, and background check legislation.”
An official spokesman for the Agudath Israel Of America Rabbi Avi Shafran told this past Friday in late afternoon exclusively to VIN news after we inquired about it : “The sentence is false” in fact In a memorandum dated June 20, 2006, Agudath Israel representatives expressed “strong support” for legislation allowing nonpublic schools to fingerprint prospective employees for the purpose of conducting mandated background checks. said Rabbi Shafran.
“The memo also states clearly that Agudath Israel does not oppose mandatory reporting”. “Agudath Israel took no position on a more recent bill would have made fingerprinting of prospective nonpublic school employees mandatory.” said Rabbi shafran.
According to the Jewish Week, Legislation requiring fingerprinting and background checks for prospective non-public school faculty was defeated in the Assembly last year but reintroduced this year by Republican Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos. The legislation does not, however, have the support of Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Lower East Side).
Borough Park, NY - Threat Made To Prominent Psychologist Bentzion Twerski Tapped by Hikind, Prompts Him To Resign
Published on: 09-10-08 at 04:03 PM
Dr. Benzion Twerski told The Jewish Week [confirmed by VIN News] Wednesday that he was quitting the task force because “I was prosecuted in the street for daring to join such a venture.”
“To protect myself, my family, and reputation, I decided to withdraw from this project,” he wrote in an e-mail as the paper was going to press with a story announcing Hikind’s formation of the task force. “From this point, I am avoiding participation in any forms of public service. Public life is not for me.”
Hikind, a Brooklyn Democrat who represents Borough Park and Flatbush, deplored Twerski’s abrupt departure from his new panel.
“He was basically forced to resign,” said Hikind. “He was literally put against the wall, and he felt he had no choice. We’ll get somebody else who’s very respected. But that’s not the point. The point is they got to him, they threatened him.”
Twerski’s dramatic departure came just as Hikind was rolling out the new panel, planned as the next step in a personal crusade against child sex abuse in the Orthodox community that he has come to view as an epidemic.
Hikind said he had amassed a dossier with the cases of “hundreds” of individuals who say they have been sexually molested by rabbis and other Orthodox community members during their childhood. And he threatened to broadcast the names of their abusers if community leaders do not respond to his call for action against them.
“Let me tell you,” he said in an interview last week, “when there’s a person who we have confirmed through a variety of people has been doing terrible things” and those who know refuse to go to the authorities, “I am prepared to name names. I am prepared to be sued by those pedophiles. If they’re innocent, let them sue me.”
Speaking after a rash of highly publicized sexual molestation cases in the Orthodox community, Hikind said, “I have been learning that a lot of people out there know who the bad guys are. Where have I been? How come no one talked to me, how come no one came to me?”
Now, Hikind says, he is more determined than
ever to establish a community task force to
address the issue. Though vague on the panel’s
broader makeup and specific plans, Hikind
ultimately seeks to develop a list of sexual
molesters in Orthodox schools to keep them away
from children.
Neither man would specify the nature of the
threats made against Twerski to force his
departure. But Hikind called them “pathetic and
sad.”
“My heart goes out to him,” he said. “I don’t know if I should laugh or cry. Things are opening up, people are coming forward, but we are still so far away.”
Hikind’s new crusade follows several cases in which individuals — often adults now — have gone public with accounts of sexual abuse they experienced at the hands of respected yeshiva teachers when they were children. The alleged victims have spoken, too, of the rejection or even intimidation they experienced from their yeshivas and rabbinic leaders when they tried to report what had happened to them.
Brooklyn, NY - Dov Hikind Keeps His Promise: Hires Respected Hasidic Ph.D. Benzion Twerski To Spearhead New Abuse Task Force