http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/opinion/16sun2.html?ref=opinion
Editorial
Justice for Child Abuse Victims
Published: May 14, 2010
The Catholic Church is working against the interests of child abuse victims in state legislatures around the country. In recent weeks, lobbying by the church has blocked measures in Wisconsin, Arizona and Connecticut intended to widen the legal window for victims to file lawsuits against hidden predators.
We urge the New York State Legislature to rise above intense lobbying by the New York State Catholic Conference and Orthodox Jewish officials and pass the overdue Child Victims Act. Like a similar measure enacted in 2003 by California, it would create a one-time, one-year suspension of the statute of limitations for bringing civil lawsuits over the sexual abuse of children.
Once that window closes, people alleging abuse would have until age 28 to bring a claim. Current law sets the limit at 23 in most circumstances.
The measure recognizes that it typically takes many years before victims are ready to come forward. The measure also recognizes the Catholic Church’s history of intimidating victims and burying abuses in church files, creating a shroud of secrecy that extended in many cases until victims were in their 30s or older, well beyond existing time limits for prosecutions or civil lawsuits.
An earlier version of the bill passed the Assembly in 2006, 2007 and 2008, but the Senate, then under Republican control, refused to consider it. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver expresses strong support for the latest bill, amended to cover abuses by both religious and non- religious entities. But he is insistent that the Senate act first before requiring his members to cast another politically sensitive vote on the issue.
The Senate Codes Committee is set to consider the measure by mid-June. The committee’s chairman, Eric Schneiderman, Democrat of Manhattan, should work to ensure passage of the bill, which has safeguards against the filing of bogus claims.
The Catholic Church fears a wave of costly settlements and damage awards like those that followed California’s temporary lifting of the statute of limitations several years ago. Those concerns, and the difficulty of trying to judge decades-old accusations, are outweighed by the need to afford victims a measure of justice, the demands of public safety, and the injustice of rewarding any group for covering up sexual abuse of children.
70 comments:
http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=175527
Outrage at 'child-starving mom' deal
By YAAKOV LAPPIN
13/05/2010
According to plea bargain, Jerusalem woman will evade prison sentence.
Children’s rights activists and organizations expressed outrage on Thursday over a plea bargain struck between state prosecutors and a mother from Jerusalem charged with knowingly starving her young son.
According to the deal, the mother will confess to child abuse offenses, thereby evading a prison sentence. She will be barred from having custody of her children for five years, during which time she will, however, be able to meet with them during supervised visits.
The plea bargain must receive approval from a Jerusalem court on Monday before going into effect.
“This is an outrageous plea bargain. It has resulted in an outcome that is lenient in the extreme for the suspect,” Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, said in a statement Thursday.
“It seems that the blood of children in Israel is horrifyingly cheap,” he said, warning that the bargain sent a dangerous message to potential future child abusers.
“State prosecutors would not dare to make such a shameful plea bargain in other offenses – even offenses considered lighter than child abuse,” Kadman added. He lamented the common use of plea bargains in settling child abuse cases, noting that 80 percent of these charges result in such bargains, and called on the courts to reject them.
Responding to the fierce criticism, Jerusalem State Prosecutor Tal Weisman said that the arrangement was guided mainly by a “a concern for the welfare of the mother’s children.
“The suspect has six children and suffers from a serious disturbance,” Weisman said, adding that the plea bargain would ensure that the mother’s contact with her children will be supervised and monitored by Social Services for years to come.
As the debate raged on Thursday, haredi Rabbi Avraham Froilich, who along with members of the haredi community in Jerusalem has maintained that the mother is innocent of all charges, called on her not to sign the plea bargain.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703950804575242751142413016.html
WASHINGTON — House leaders are revamping the rules for lawmakers and aides who travel overseas on official government business, forbidding them to fly in business class on shorter trips, use taxpayer funds to buy gifts or pocket unspent cash, among other changes.
But the rules don't require lawmakers to disclose some of the biggest costs of such trips, including travel by military plane, which can double or triple the total costs.
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/levy-phillips-amp-konigsberg-llp,1299506.shtml
Levy Phillips & Konigsberg, LLP have filed a nationwide class action lawsuit alleging "deceptive marketing and sale of health insurance for convalescent care" by New York Life Insurance Company, United States Life Insurance Company in the City of New York, and Hadassah the Women's Zionist Organization of America, Inc.
The action was brought on behalf of a ninety-year-old Hadassah member and potentially thousands of other members who have purchased or renewed the Hadassah Group Catastrophic Major Medical Plan or Hadassah Group Excess Major Medical Plan including those who have incurred expenses for unreimbursed nursing home, home health, nursing, or other convalescent facility care. The complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on December 23, 2009.
The complaint alleges that Hadassah members enrolled in its Group Catastrophic Major Medical Plan or Hadassah Group Excess Major Medical Plan have been defrauded because despite its marketing materials that promised coverage for nursing home and convalescent care benefits "regardless of your age," the plan cut off these benefits at age sixty five.
The complaint further alleges that in sharp contrast to the age restriction concealed deep within their insurance certificate, the defendants not only advertised the insurance plan as one without any age restrictions, but also sold an insurance policy to then seventy-year-old Deborah Schandler, the named plaintiff in this case, as well as accepted renewal payments from her for sixteen consecutive years. However, when the time came to fulfill their contractual duty to provide coverage to their "insured" when she needed it most, defendant New York Life denied coverage for over $50,000 in convalescent care charges on Mrs. Schandler's policy.
Diane Paolicelli and Theresa A. Vitello, the lead plaintiffs' attorneys handling the case at Levy Phillips & Konigsberg, LLP, estimate that there could be hundreds, if not thousands, of elderly Hadassah members who fell victim to the defendants' actions.
http://www.wral.com/news/national_world/national/story/7603557/
The assistant principal at a California high school has been placed on leave after a campus talent show where male students pranced seductively in underwear and Speedos.
The second cousin of California Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner is accused of submitting checks for auto claims exceeding the amount required for repairs and pocketing the difference.
Paul Daniel Poizner, an adjuster for California Casualty Management, pleaded not guilty to 60 counts linked to the alleged scheme, according to the Los Angeles Times. He was arrested following an investigation by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office Insurance Fraud Bureau of Investigation.
Prosecutors allege that Paul Poizner, 45, stole $300,000.
The scheme was uncovered during a company audit of auto damage claims submitted between May 2008 and February 2009, the Times reported, citing a criminal complaint filed by Los Angeles County prosecutors.
A spokesman for the California Department of Insurance said California Casualty informed prosecutors and state regulators about their findings in March after learning the identity of the suspect, Steve Poizner, who is running for governor in California
http://www.gainesville.com/article/20100515/ARTICLES/100519543/0/SPORTS
Message on car criticizing Obama leads to two arrests
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/kosher_meal_crisis_hitting_city_JHOSU2KZmyBnyk009RWdjP
A holy war has erupted over the city's funding of kosher Meals on Wheels -- leaving thousands of elderly homebound Jews worried about their next meal.
At least two charities that deliver daily meals to homebound seniors say they no longer have enough money to pay for the more expensive kosher food.
In order to cut costs, the groups -- which are contracted by the city -- may soon stop delivering kosher lunches and dinners to some clients, and are trying to determine who's Orthodox and who isn't in an attempt to implement cutbacks.
"How do you tell if someone is Jewish?" asked one religious leader. "Ask them to take down their pants to see if they're circumcised? It's beyond belief."
Kosher cuisine costs $2 more to prepare than non-kosher meals, the charities say.
But city officials say they've been paying a flat $7-per-meal fee to the charities for three years, and shouldn't be blamed if the groups suddenly want to redo their contracts.
"There are other providers that can make it work," said Commissioner Lilliam Barrios-Paoli, of the Department for the Aging.
Encore Community Services insists it struggles to feed its clients -- 1,000 seniors and 100 Orthodox Jews in Manhattan.
"There's no additional money for the kosher meals," said Sister Lillian McNamara, a Catholic nun who runs the nondenominational group. "Only strict observant folks are going to get it."
The kosher cutbacks have seniors like Miriam Wenger, 85, who escaped the Nazis by hiding in a barn with little or no food for nearly two years, very anxious.
She has been a volunteer since 1998 and, along with others, serves more than 70 prepared lunches every weekday at a center on West 76th Street between Columbus and Amsterdam avenues.
"I know what it is to struggle for food," said the Polish Holocaust survivor.
"If you don't serve these people kosher food, they are going to starve," she warned. "If the meals are non-kosher they won't touch it."
lakewood is being destroyed from within and out!
will responsible leadership please step up to the plate and lead us. we have too many fools being kofetz b'rosh making noise and making problems worse!
http://www.whas11.com/news/local/New-details-released-on-charges-of-rape-and-burglary-by-volunteer-census-worker--93319034.html
There were new developments on Monday in the arrest of a census worker accused of raping a handicapped woman in southern Indiana.
The man may have left behind clues at the crime scene in Washington County that quickly led to his arrest.
WHAS11’s Stephanie Collins was in Pekin on Monday with more on the story.
Daniel Miller had been with the Census department for two weeks, knocking on many doors in Pekin Indiana.
Many in this small community remember him, but it wasn't his picture that led to his swift arrest.
Debbie Bishop remembers the man from the Census Bureau and that his next stop was the house she rents, down the road.
It was in this Pekin, Indiana home where a 21-year-old mentally and physically handicapped woman was raped.
Daniel Miller was arrested Saturday morning and charged with burglary and rape. Court documents show a bizarre turn of events.
Miller's clothes, including his jeans, underwear, t-shirt, and his wallet with his driver's license and boots were all left in the victim's bedroom.
Within five hours of the rape, the Washington County Sheriff's Department and Salem police were knocking on Miller's apartment door. He was found in a back bedroom, nude, with a .03 blood alcohol level allegedly telling police he had no memory of what happened.
The arrest of a census worker for rape has this small community upset.
According to police, at least one item belonging to the victim was found in Miller's car.
Miller is in the Washington County Detention Center on a $150,000 full cash bond.
The Census Bureau would have done a background check on Miller, and would have found the same thing the sheriff found – nothing. Miller has apparently never been arrested.
HELP RESTOCK THE COFFEE ROOM< SO WE CAN HOCK A GANTZE NACHT:
On the yom tov of Matan Torah, the Ir HaTorah rejoices. All night long the streets of Lakewood are filled with people streaming to and from hundreds of shuls and batei medrash as thousands of guests and visitors converge on the town, eager to join in the stupendous learning on the first night of yom tov. The ruach is palpable. At the center of it all, in the great batei medrash of Beth Medrash Govoha, generations of sons, fathers and grandfathers join the illustrious ranks of Torah yungeleit. Talmidim of all ages blend their voices in the Kol Torah whose pure sweet notes sing out on every breeze.
To experience even one Shavuos in Lakewood is an inspiration that can last a lifetime, but even if you can’t be there in person, you can still take part in the Yeshiva’s grand celebration of Kabolas HaTorah; you can still share in the zechus of this awesome night of learning.
Each year, the Yeshiva puts up a signboard in the main bais medrash with the names of individuals in whose honor or memory the learning of Layl Shavuos is dedicated. You can dedicate the Shavuos night learning in the names of your loved ones by being menadev tzedaka with a gift of $36 or more to Beth Medrash Govoha.
Filed at 10:34 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court ruled Monday that federal officials can indefinitely hold inmates considered ''sexually dangerous'' after their prison terms are complete.
The high court reversed a lower court decision that said Congress overstepped its authority in allowing indefinite detentions of considered ''sexually dangerous.''
When I try to reserve a shtender in BMG Shavuos night after maariv by opening up a sefer, please do not close the sefer and take the shtender before I come back.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/world/middleeast/18chomsky.html
JERUSALEM — A fierce debate broke out in Israel on Monday amid finger pointing and hand wringing over the country’s refusal a day earlier to permit Noam Chomsky, the linguist and icon of the American left, to enter the occupied West Bank from Jordan.
Front-page coverage and heated morning radio discussions asked how Mr. Chomsky, an 81-year-old professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, could pose a risk to Israel and how a country that frequently asserts its status as a robust democracy could keep out people whose views it found offensive.
Mr. Chomsky, who is Jewish and spent time living on a kibbutz in Israel in the 1950s, is an outspoken critic both of American and Israeli policy. He has objected to Israel’s foundation as a Jewish state
The decision to bar him from entering the West Bank to speak at Birzeit, a Palestinian university, “is a foolish act in a frequent series of recent follies,” remarked Boaz Okun, the legal commentator of the mass-selling newspaper Yediot Aharonot, in his Monday column.
Moustafa Barghouti, who was to be Mr. Chomsky’s host in the West Bank, angrily condemned Israel’s refusal to let him in, saying, “The decision of Israel to prevent Professor Chomsky from entering the Palestinian Territories is a result of the numerous campaigns against Chomsky organized by the Jewish lobby in the United States.”
And a few months earlier that year, Norman Finkelstein, a scholar who harshly attacks Israel and its policies, was barred from entering after a visit in Lebanon that included conversations with officials of Hezbollah.
Does anyone know if Babad from Tartikov 19th Ave is a stooge of Margo?
He pulled the hashgocho from Caraville restaurant and put up signs all over town to beware.
Caraville is owned by Margo's arch-enemy Julie Whiteman who sued Margo for big bucks years ago.
Babad is not exactly a reliable hashgocho. If this has any bearing I have no idea.
Pat Buchanan in Editorial: Too Many Jews on the Supreme Court
New York - A chorus of black commentators and civic leaders has begun expressing frustration over (Elena) Kagan's hiring record as Harvard dean. From 2003 to 2009, 29 faculty members were hired: 28 were white and one was Asian-American."
CNN pundit Roland Martin slammed "Kagan's record on diversity as one that a 'white Republican U.S. president' would be criticized for."
This is an excerpt from the Washington Post about the rising anger in a black community, which voted 24-1 for Obama, that one of their own was once again passed over for the Supreme Court.
Not since Thurgood Marshall, 43 years ago, has a Democratic president chosen an African-American. The lone sitting black justice is Clarence Thomas, nominated by George H. W. Bush. And Thomas was made to run a gauntlet by Senate liberals.
Indeed, of the last seven justices nominated by Democrats JFK, LBJ, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, one was black, Marshall; one was Puerto Rican, Sonia Sotomayor. The other five were Jews: Arthur Goldberg, Abe Fortas, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan
If Kagan is confirmed, Jews, who represent less than 2 percent of the U.S. population, will have 33 percent of the Supreme Court seats.
Is this the Democrats' idea of diversity?
15 comments so far and not one related to UOJ's post about the Markey Bill. I urge everyone to sign this petition in support of the Markey Bill (Child Victims Act):
http://stopabusecampaign.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/us/18spill.html?hp
Napolitano acknowledged, however, that the government was largely at BP’s mercy in stopping the leak and addressing much of the oil in the water.
“Frankly,” she said, “the federal government has limited capability and expertise in responding to wellhead incidents on the sea floor. Nonetheless, the federal government has mobilized scientists and industry experts to collaborate with BP to identify and execute the best strategies for sealing the well, and the president has tasked the Department of Energy to participate in providing any possible expertise on that front.”
Also on Monday, the longtime top federal regulator of offshore drilling in the gulf said that he was resigning at the end of the month, according to an Interior Department official.
The regulator, Chris C. Oynes, ran the New Orleans office of the Minerals Management Service for 12 years, overseeing all offshore operations and revenue collections, until he was promoted to a senior position in Washington in 2007. His tenure in the gulf coincided with a 50 percent increase in offshore oil production, but also in a number of allegations that the minerals service had failed to collect billions of dollars in revenues owed the federal government and had been lax in its oversight of the safety practices of offshore drillers.
Interior Department officials would not say whether Mr. Oynes’s resignation was voluntary.
continued
But so far the residents, who paid between $280,000 and $445,000 for their condos, have received little money and are struggling to come up with the millions of dollars needed for building repairs to make their homes conform to DOB regulations. Nor has Brach transferred the air rights from the adjacent lot to bring the building's height into compliance with the zoning law. (Brach has said that the zoning lot development agreement never came to fruition because the original owner of the lots reneged on a business deal that delayed the transfer of air rights, a dispute that was settled in a rabbinical court ruling that is not publicly available, according to people with knowledge of the case.)
Residents find this hard to believe, given the convenient timing and the fact that the architect of Spencer Street, Henry Radusky of (Boro Park) Brooklyn-based Bricolage Designs, had gained a reputation for exploiting the faculty housing exemption. In its complaint against Brach, the attorney general alleged that Brach's failure to reveal the faculty housing exemption along with leaving the building with defects and never securing a permanent certificate of occupancy, amounted to fraud.
Through the years, Spencer Street residents have been flabbergasted by the city and state's inability to persuade Brach to make amends, and by the fact that he has never faced criminal prosecution. They all suspect that Brach has political connections.
Brach's "ability to engage in fraud without consequence over numerous years does raise suspicions that someone in power may be trying to protect him," says Assembly Member Hakeem Jeffries.
Brach has offered to fix the building's violations himself and effectuate the zoning lot merger—if the residents waive the $10.9 million judgment that also prevents him prohibits his actions in real estate.
So far, most of the money that the residents have received has been in the form of garnished wages from Brach's job at a Brooklyn Bakery, which amounts to just $280, or $3.88 per unit, a month. Bailey, Spencer Street's lawyer, says that Brach may be trying to hide assets. As late as 2006, Brach had an "approximate net worth of $44 million.... almost all of it in real estate investments," Bailey wrote in an email.
Brach declined to be interviewed
Monestime is unsure how to proceed. On one hand, she wants the bureaucratic and financial nightmare to end. On the other is her desire for Brach to be held accountable. "We're going to drop a $10 million judgment for air rights that should have been ours from the beginning?" she says. "It's just so twisted."
http://www.citylimits.org/news/articles/3999/saga-of-the-worthless-condo
Monestime's was one of 72 families, most of them first-time home buyers, who in 2004 bought into the Spencer Street condominiums in Bedford-Stuyvesant only to find a year later that their investments were worthless because the developer, Mendel Brach, failed to comply with zoning rules when he constructed four nine-story buildings in a neighborhood typically capped at five stories.
When Brach submitted the plan for the four Spencer Street buildings to the Department of Buildings (DOB) in 2002, he said that the apartments would be reserved for faculty members of the Beth Chana School for Girls, a yeshiva based in Williamsburg. Under the zoning code's community facilities exemption, this allowed him to give each structure an extra four stories.
But a year later he submitted a plan to the state attorney general's office, then run by Eliot Spitzer, to sell the units on the open market, and made no mention of faculty housing. He claimed instead that he would overcome the height restriction through a "zoning lot development agreement," a technical process whereby a building can rise higher than normal if an adjacent property remains low-rise.
Brach never went through with that zoning lot development agreement. Because the buildings were rife with defects and building code violations, in 2005 the city revoked each building's temporary certificate of occupancy--the document that entitles owners to legally occupy, refinance or sell their property.
Had the DOB caught these problems before Monestime closed on the property, the sale never would have gone through. But during the time between the building's construction and the decision to revoke its certificate of occupancy, city inspectors approved a temporary certificate of occupancy three times, just long enough for the sales to be completed and the residents to move in.
With no certificate of occupancy, the residents have been forced to keep up on mortgage payments on properties they cannot legally sell or refinance. They worry that their money is going into a black hole.
After years of false starts in negotiation with Brach, Andrew Cuomo's office sued the developer in September 2009, alleging six counts of fraud. Brach settled the suit by consenting to a judgment of $10.9 million to be awarded to the Spencer Street residents. He also agreed not to sell condos for five years. The agreement did not require him to admit fault.
I am very pleased to report to the public that in the last 48 hours, 40 people per hour or one new person every 1.5 minutes, is signing the petition supporting the Childs Victims Act.
PLEASE understand that politicians are overwhelmed when the public responds with such fervor.
Please ask everyone you know to sign the petition.
UOJ
http://open.nysenate.gov/legislation/bill/S7391
S7391: Penalizes by a minimum fine of $2500 persons who knowingly rent residential property in violation of state or local occupancy limits, zoning, or rules
S7391 - REFERRED TO JUDICIARY - Apr 7, 2010
Whoever believes the White House version of events can buy the Brooklyn Bridge from me.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/us/18aunt.html?hpw
Obama’s Aunt Is Granted Asylum on Second Try
BOSTON — An immigration judge has granted asylum to President Obama’s aunt, allowing her to stay in the United States and possibly become a citizen in about six years, her lawyers said Monday.
Zeituni Onyango, 57, who lives in public housing in South Boston, is the half-sister of Mr. Obama’s late father and is from Kenya.
While people seeking asylum must show that they would face persecution if they returned to their homeland, the exact basis of Ms. Onyango’s claim, and the judge’s decision, remained private.
Ms. Onyango applied for asylum in 2002. She was rejected in 2004 and ordered to leave the country, but she continued to fight the order and stayed in the country illegally. She was living here in relative anonymity until just before the 2008 presidential election, when The Times of London found her in what it described as “rundown public housing.”
Mr. Obama’s aides said at the time that he had not known his aunt was in the United States illegally
White House officials said Mr. Obama had played no role in the case.
It turned out that Ms. Onyango had made small contributions to Mr. Obama’s campaign, amounting to $265
She attended Mr. Obama’s inauguration in January in Washington
Ms. Wong has said that if Ms. Onyango were forced to return to Kenya, she would face undue attention and perhaps danger because her nephew was so famous.
Ms. Wong said in a statement that after the granting of asylum, Ms. Onyango could apply for a work permit, a Social Security number and a driver’s license or state identification card. After one year, she could apply for a permanent green card, and then in five years for citizenship.
Julie Whiteman had previously owned the Essex on Coney branch in Downtown Manhattan under the OU.
Because of this tussle with Babad he closed Caraville 2 days ago and the website is no longer working. Whiteman claims that he had originally planned to close the restaurant in June but sped things up a bit due to the current circumstance.
His machlokes with Margulies stemmed from an injury he suffered in the building when he used to teach at Torah Temimah. Although the injury was very significant, preventing him from working for many years after that, Margulies refused any payout from YTT's insurance to pay Whiteman's medical bills because he didn't want to pay higher premiums. You can look up this case at the NY State court website by searching under "Juli Whiteman" exactly how I spelled it here.
Rubashkin's South American meat, "Tevye", seems to be named after the character created by the Maskil nicknamed Sholom Aleichem.
One of the frierdikke Lubavitcher Rebbes reissed kriah when another Maskil who was a chaver of Sholom Aleichem married his daughter.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/nyregion/18nyc.html?hp
May 17, 2010
A Reading to Recall the Father of Tevye
By CLYDE HABERMAN
Millions, however, feel they know Sholom Aleichem through his writings, which go well beyond the character most familiar to Americans, Tevye the Dairyman of “Fiddler on the Roof” fame.
Sholom Aleichem was a pseudonym assumed by Sholom Rabinowitz, born in 1859 in what is now Ukraine.
Sholom Aleichem left a will requesting that on his yahrzeit — in Yiddish, the annual memorial of his death — his descendants and good friends should come together to read the will and recite one of his stories.
Filed at 11:06 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Interior Secretary Ken Salazar concedes the government failed to hold the oil industry accountable and ensure safety in offshore oil drilling.
This is very touching but it would have been a nicer story if the bride was actually Black.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/fashion/weddings/16ROSENGARTENVMM.html
Danielle Brody Rosengarten and Kenneth Paul Vogel were married Saturday evening on the rooftop of 101 Constitution Avenue, an office building in Washington. Rabbi Jack Moline officiated.
The bride, 31, is a counsel and legislative assistant in Washington for Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut; she advises him on climate change legislation. She graduated cum laude from Tufts University and received a law degree from American University Washington College of Law.
She is a daughter of Susanne Brody of Greenwich, Conn., and the late Glen S. Rosengarten. Her mother is a lawyer in charge of the White Plains federal defender’s office for the United States District Court, Southern District of New York. The bride’s father was a co-creator and the chief executive of Food Emporium, the grocery chain.
The bridegroom, 34, is a senior staff writer in Arlington, Va., for Politico, the political news Web site and newspaper, for which he covers campaign finance and the conservative movement. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin.
He is a son of Ruth S. Vogel and Morris J. Vogel of New York. His mother is a clinical psychologist in private practice in New York. His father is the president of the Lower East Side Tenement Museum.
The couple met in May 2006, when Ms. Rosengarten began a summer law clerkship in Washington with the House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security. Mr. Vogel was finishing a 10-month journalism fellowship through the American Political Science Association, during which he, too, worked for the committee staff. They sat in adjoining cubicles in the Ford House Office Building.
During her first week, they bonded over lunch in the cafeteria when they discovered a shared love of Ethiopian food and kosher pastrami
http://cbs3.com/wireapnewsde/Temp.worker.co.2.1699548.html
A temporary-worker magnate has been charged with scamming the New York State Insurance Fund out of $25 million in payments he owed for workers' compensation insurance.
Eric Goldstein pleaded not guilty Monday to charges including insurance fraud.
Manhattan prosecutors say his company, GT Systems, ran 50 temp agencies. Prosecutors say he avoided paying premiums to the state fund for years while having employees make fake insurance certificates.
The 61-year-old Goldstein is also accused of underreporting his payroll and misclassifying workers' occupations.
Defense lawyer Gerald Shargel says Goldstein plans to fight the complex charges.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/nyregion/18blumenthal.html
At a ceremony honoring veterans and senior citizens who sent presents to soldiers overseas, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut rose and spoke of an earlier time in his life.
“We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam,” Mr. Blumenthal said to the group gathered in Norwalk in March 2008. “And you exemplify it. Whatever we think about the war, whatever we call it — Afghanistan or Iraq — we owe our military men and women unconditional support.”
There was one problem: Mr. Blumenthal, a Democrat now running for the United States Senate, never served in Vietnam. He obtained at least five military deferments from 1965 to 1970 and took repeated steps that enabled him to avoid going to war, according to records.
The deferments allowed Mr. Blumenthal to complete his studies at Harvard; pursue a graduate fellowship in England; serve as a special assistant to The Washington Post’s publisher, Katharine Graham; and ultimately take a job in the Nixon White House.
But what is striking about Mr. Blumenthal’s record is the contrast between the many steps he took that allowed him to avoid Vietnam, and the misleading way he often speaks about that period of his life now, especially when he is speaking at veterans’ ceremonies or other patriotic events.
Sometimes his remarks have been plainly untrue, as in his speech to the group in Norwalk. At other times, he has used more ambiguous language, but the impression left on audiences can be similar.
---
At an Agudah event, Lipa Margulies rose and spoke of an earlier time in his life.
“We have learned something important since the days that I learned in Torah Vodaas,” Margulies said to the group gathered at a fresser hotel in 2008. “And you exemplify it. Whatever we think about molesters — we owe Torah Temimah unconditional support.”
There was one problem: Margulies, a self-described "rosh yeshiva", never learned in Torah Vodaas. He obtained at least five deferments to instead drive the yeshiva's bus and took repeated steps that enabled him to avoid stepping foot in beis medrash, according to records.
The deferments allowed Margulies to earn a bus driver's license at the DMV and ultimately steal Torah's Vodaas's name for fundraising purposes.
But what is striking about Margulies’s record is the contrast between the many steps he took that allowed him to avoid learning a word, and the misleading way he often speaks about that period of his life now, especially when he is speaking at Agudah ceremonies or other fresser events.
Sometimes his remarks have been plainly untrue, as in his speech to the Agudah. At other times, he has used more ambiguous language, but the impression left on audiences can be similar.
http://www.thechief-leader.com/news/2010-05-21/News_of_the_week/Council_Enlists_Black_Hats_In_Fight_to_Save_Day_Ca.html
Council Enlists ‘Black Hats’ In Fight to Save Day Care
Centers, Vouchers Threatened
By DAVID SIMS
Members of the City Council’s Brooklyn delegation protested planned cuts to day-care programs at City Hall May 12. While past rallies have mostly featured union members and parents from affected centers, this crowd was made up largely of Hasidic Jews, educators and administrators from afterschool programs that are also being cut.
BARUCH HASHEM, HERE IS ANOTHER PIDYON SHEVUYIM OPPORTUNITY:
Pesach Lerner representing National Council of Young Israel and Chaim Dovid Zweibel of Agudath Israel have pulled their orgainzational endorsements off of the latest snake oil scam.
They originally endorsed and Agudath Israel conventions hosted booths for AREIVIM Life Insurance Program. It has since been determined to be a fraud. Plain and simple it's called an AFFINITY SCAM. If things are too good to be true, it's a bold faced lie!
AREIVIM tried to circumvent the insurance regulators and reinvent the wheel. Better have Pinny Lipschutz start the Pidyon Shevuyim campaign.
I bet you didn't know that Shea Fishman's shul in Williamsburg was originally started by Reform Jews who only broke with the movement because they thought playing an organ during Shabbos davening was too much.
Oh, and Democrat District Leader Steve Cohn, who is a crony of mine, was bar mitzvaed in Fishman's shul.
http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=31&id=35454
WILLIAMSBURG — The oldest Orthodox Jewish synagogue in all of Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island — one of the few remnants of the non-Hasidic Jewish community that thrived in Williamsburg until the 1960s — celebrated its 141st anniversary on Sunday with a dinner that attracted several well-known figures from the legal and political communities.
The synagogue is Congregation Beth Jacob Ohev Sholom, led since 1971 by Rabbi Joshua Fishman, who until recently, headed an international Hebrew-school support organization, and 85-year-old president Morris Schulman.
According to Marty Needelman, longtime director of Brooklyn Legal Services Corporation A and a trustee of the synagogue, “In 1971, you had 700 people coming to services here. Now, on Saturdays, you get about 25 people; on other days you get 12.”
Nevertheless, said Needelman, the congregation has attracted some younger members. Of the older people, some are Holocaust survivors.
The synagogue was founded in 1869 by traditional Jews who were members of a local Reform synagogue and were angry that this synagogue installed an organ for Yom Kippur services, a violation of traditional Jewish law. The first Jews who lived in the area were German Jews, as Reform Judaism was strong in Germany.
Other prominent Brooklynites who attended the anniversary dinner included prominent attorney and Democratic District Leader Steve Cohn and Assemblyman Joe Lentol. Lentol told the Eagle that although he himself is not Jewish, his, father, mother and aunt all spoke Yiddish because the neighborhood was so heavily Jewish.
“We had a store, and we had to be able to talk to the Yiddish customers,” said the assemblyman, who added that it was “an honor” to make a presentation at the dinner.
Cohn told the Eagle that “the synagogue is where I had my bar mitzvah. I go back there all the time — it reminds me of my dad, who was an assemblyman and was involved in the synagogue. The dinner is a wonderful annual event.”
The guest speaker at the dinner was Rabbi Oscar Ehrenreich, longtime principal of the Beth Jacob girls’ school in Borough Park, which has 2,000 students. A writer for the Best in Jewish Williamsburg blog was impressed that in addition to the scriptures, the rabbi quoted Tom Wolfe’s You Can’t Go Home Again.
The synagogue’s current building, at 284 Rodney St., near Broadway, was built in 1957 – the original building was demolished as a result of the building of the Brooklyn Queens Expressway.
http://www.goldbergandcohn.com/attorney_profile_sdc.html
I'm also Vice President of Yeshiva of Flatbush. Leave my Rebbe Vito Lopez alone.
http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/19/wb_districtleader_2010_05_07_bk.html
They couldn’t defeat Brooklyn Democratic Party Boss, Assemblyman Vito Lopez, and they couldn’t beat his hand-picked candidate for City Council, Steve Levin, so now a group of Democratic insurgents in Williamsburg is going after the next biggest (or, in this case, smallest) target — the neighborhood’s district leader, Steve Cohn.
Lincoln Restler, a leader of the New Kings Democrats, announced his candidacy for unpaid state committeeman spot on Tuesday, setting up a battle against the longtime incumbent and Downtown Brooklyn attorney for this little-known, and low-powered, elective office.
Already the sparks are flying!
“The party is dysfunctional and a relic of old machine politics,” said Restler. “We need energetic leaders to work hard for our community, who are committed to accountability to our democratic system.”
Cohn is well-liked and has a long track record of community involvement — and is best known for his annual fall breakfast at Junior’s that draws top elected officials from every strata of the political world with the possible exception of the White House.
Cohn is tied to Lopez through the party office that he’s held for 27 years.
http://brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/21/bh_cohndropsout_2010_05_21_bk.html
Longtime Democratic District Leader Steve Cohn has apparently abandoned his re-election campaign, hoping to have his son, Warren, succeed him — all with the apparent blessing of the county’s Democratic boss, Assemblyman Vito Lopez.
On Thursday afternoon, Warren Cohn announced his candidacy for the obscure, little-known position that his father has held for nearly three decades.
“I’ve been wanting to run for office, and I think I can have a good influence on the community,” Cohn, a staffer for Rep. Ed Towns (D-Fort Greene), wrote on his Facebook page.
The younger Cohn faces a formidable challenge from feisty reform candidate Lincoln Restler, a leader of the two-year-old New Kings Democrats club, who is running more against Lopez than against either Cohn.
The job itself is fairly routine. State committeemembers — there are four per assembly district, two per party — are responsible for hiring poll workers during Election Day, approving judicial candidates for civil court and filling party vacancies.
Oh, and they also select the county chairman — and Lopez clearly wants to keep the job.
To do so, Lopez is not only backing candidates against district leaders who displease him, but created five, unelected at-large district leaders — and then filled them with his allies.
As a result of Lopez’s power grab, Alan Fleishman, a district leader in a neighboring assembly district, said he would no longer seek re-election.
http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/21/all_lopezpacksit_2010_05_21_bk.html
Brooklyn Democratic Party Chairman Vito Lopez has made a controversial move to bolster his own power base by packing an obscure, but powerful, state committee with unelected loyalists.
Lopez, who is also a longtime assemblyman from Bushwick, has appointed five “at large” state committeemen to an otherwise elected body that is comprised of two “district leaders” from each assembly district in the state.
Lopez filled the new spots with longtime supporters, including former Assemblyman Frank Seddio (D-Bergen Beach) and state Sen. Martin Dilan (D-Bushwick).
As a result of Lopez’s secret move, one longtime critic of the chairman who was planning to run for re-election as district leader dropped out of the race immediately.
“These [at-large committeemen] have been put in place to dilute our position,” said Alan Fleishman, who has represented Brownstone Brooklyn for eight years and was just ramping up his re-election race against Stephen Williamson, a newcomer who is backed by Lopez.
“It was bad enough that [Lopez] had complete control over every single move, but now there are five more seats loyal to him,” Fleishman added. “There’s really no democracy under Vito. It’s always been his way or the highway, but now you can’t even fight it because he’ll win every vote.”
Lopez’s move to pack the state committee with loyalists needed the blessing of federal Department of Justice because Brooklyn’s history of electoral discrimination puts the county under ongoing federal oversight. Lopez has said he received the blessing last week, though that assertion could not be verified before our deadline.
District leaders are unpaid party officials responsible for collecting candidate petition signatures, finding viable judicial candidates and hiring poll workers on Election Day, but their main job is selecting the party’s county chairman — a post that Lopez apparently wants to keep.
As a result, this year’s contests are turning into a desperate battle for the soul of Brooklyn’s Democratic Party, with loyalists to Lopez squaring off against longtime incumbents, and insurgents preparing to pick off Lopez-backed incumbents. For example:
• In the neighboring 50th Assembly District, for example, Lincoln Restler of the progressive New Kings Democrats, has challenged longtime district leader, and Lopez supporter, Steve Cohn. It now appears that Cohn has dropped out of that race in hopes of having his son succeed him.
• And in the same district as Fleishman, another Lopez-backed newcomer, Hope Reichbach, is challenging anti-Lopez district leader Jo Anne Simon.
• In Bay Ridge, Kevin Peter Carroll is savaging longtime leader Ralph Perfetto on the campaign trail, saying that Perfetto is too close to Lopez.
Lopez wants to retain his job so badly that he’s stacking the deck in his favor, some say.
“Nobody cares about [district leader] jobs except Vito,” said Restler.
There is no way that Obama would have allowed his auntie Zeitouni (Arabic for olive) to be deported. It would be too much of a spectacle and a political disaster.
Why isn't the White House investigated for who was talking to the judge in the case just like Dick Cheney's staff was put under the microscope?
It really says something when even the radical Left Huffington Post is angry about this.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/raymond-j-learsy/elena-kagans-strange-bedf_b_578042.html
Elena Kagan's Strange Bedfellows
In May of last year, Elena Kagan, as Solicitor General, filed an amicus brief before the Supreme Court against the claim of thousands of victims and family members of the September 11 terrorist attack. Her brief petitioned the Supreme Court, urging the court not to hear the plaintiffs arguments, and to let stand lower court rulings that held that the Saudi government as well as senior members of the Saudi royal family could not be sued in U.S. courts nor by U.S. citizens under their rigid interpretation of "sovereign immunity."
The Supreme Court sided with Kagan's argumentation. This in spite of the fact that the plaintiffs claimed they could provide clear evidence that the Saudis had dispersed millions of dollars in support of al-Qaeda in the years leading up to the September 11 attacks.
The ruling caused outrage among a number of U.S. Senators including Senator Arlen Specter (D-Pa), Lindsey Graham (R.-S.C.) and Charles Schumer (D-NY). Schumer would comment,
"She wants to coddle the Saudis."
Today, appearing on a Sunday talking heads program, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich castigated Kagan for having accepted money from the Saudis while Dean of Harvard Law. Germane? Possibly, possibly not, but now a fact to be considered, given her amicus brief.
The disappointment among families of the victims was profound. "We were terribly disappointed with her ruling," Beverly Burnett of Northfield, Minn. was quoted in the Philadelphia Inquirer. Her son perished on Flight 93 near Shanksville, Pa. "We had hoped she would be with us so we could have our day in court."
Importantly, Kagan's nomination brings up again the issue of "Sovereign Immunity," and what it portends to our safety.
Kagan's argumentation to the Court raises the very troubling question that if "Sovereign Immunity" is extended to Saudi princes, how can we effectively deal with the issue of terrorism? It would mean a tier of engaged protagonists would be free to function as instigators and supporters of terrorism, accountable to no one, least of all in the courts of law where their alleged intercession took the lives of thousands.
The prospect of Kagan sitting on the Court parsing these issues becomes particularly troubling. Consider the flip side of this matter. That is to say, if the princes did what the 9-11 families alleged they did, acting thereby on behalf of or as a sovereign state for which and/or through which they are claiming immunity, then their alleged criminality would no longer be limited to a conspiracy to murder. It becomes, because of its standing as a sovereign act, an act of war.
What a disgrace!
Steve Cohn from Shea Fishman's shul and the VP of Yeshiva of Flatbush has his annual breakfast in Junior's, a treif restaurant.
Archie always finds the embarrassing & incriminating details in every story. No wonder why Shmarya kicked him off Failed Messiah.
Junior's makes cheesecakes in an outside factory under the Chof K which Steve Cohn shnors some for me every Shavuos.
But don't tell anyone because they are cholov stam!
http://newyork.realestaterama.com/2010/05/18/attorney-sentenced-in-manhattan-federal-court-to-20-months-in-prison-for-deceiving-clients-in-real-estate-deals-ID01090.html
HUGH ZUBER — a lawyer formerly employed by the Office of the Corporation Counsel for the City of New York — was sentenced today in Manhattan Federal court to 20 months in prison for defrauding two former clients whom ZUBER had represented in a personal capacity in connection with their sale of real estate. ZUBER previously pleaded guilty to two counts of mail fraud in December 2009. The sentence was imposed by United States District Judge RICHARD M. BERMAN.
http://www.legalnewsline.com/news/227095-dow-settles-with-furniture-retailer
A Monmouth County furniture retailer will pay up to $216,938 in civil penalties to the state of New Jersey following a settlement with state Attorney General Paula Dow.
Spectrum Home Furnishings, Inc., and Charles Serouya & Son, Inc., also known as Gallery, CS&S, INC., and Charles Serouya, Inc., agreed, under terms of the settlement, to resolve existing and future consumer complaints, revise their business practices and pay the $216,938 in penalties and reimbursements to the state.
The companies, which are all owned by Charles Serouya, are alleged to have violated the state's Consumer Fraud Act and related regulations through their delivery of defective or non-conforming merchandise. The company is also alleged to have failed to provide consumers with refunds for the merchandise.
This putz has like 5 luxury cars parked in his driveway.
He also has an army of defenders, including a "Chana G", posting defenses of him in the newspaper article comments. You would think that he is the latest crook to be made Agudah poster boy:
Agents from the Attorney General's Medicaid Fraud Control Section today arrested a Montgomery County foot doctor accused of submitting false insurance claims and bilking insurance companies out of more than $155,000.
Attorney General Tom Corbett said that Robert Kanowitz, 55, 418 Redleaf Road, Wynnewood, allegedly submitted claims for performing nail avulsions, which is a surgical procedure involving the partial removal of a toenail, when he was really only trimming toenails, which is not compensable under the Medical Assistance program.
Evidence and testimony regarding the alleged criminal activity was presented to a statewide investigating grand jury, which recommended the charges being filed today.
According to the grand jury, the investigation began when one of the insurance companies affected alerted agents from the Attorney General's Medicaid Fraud Control Section about Kanowitz due to his billing of an unusually high number of nail avulsions.
According to the investigation, Kanowitz allegedly billed various insurance companies for more than 3,600 nail avulsions from January, 2005, to January, 2008, and was paid more than $155,000 due to his fraudulent claims.
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/investigators&id=7434149
Westchester County stays on the backs of pedophiles released from prison so they don't touch anymore kids.
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/investigators&id=7438239
Eyewitness News takes a looks at what you need to know about sex offenders to keep your family safe. How they often target their victims and what you should tell your children.
Another thing to be aware of, there is enormous crossover in deviant behavior. For instance, someone who is listed as a child molester could also rape adults if given the opportunity.
For more of Sarah Wallace's interview with Former Judge Rory Bellantoni, CLICK HERE.
Where do I find Margo's accountant?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/business/20whistleblower.html?ref=business&src=me&pagewanted=print
Hedge funds have found a new market to invest in: whistle-blowers.
Informants who turn in tax cheats have to wait years to get their share of any reward from the I.R.S.’s recently expanded whistle-blower program. So hedge funds, private equity groups and other big investors are offering an alternative. They are essentially agreeing to buy a percentage of those future payouts in exchange for a smaller amount upfront to the whistle-blowers.
The surging size of the potential awards is driving all the interest. Three years ago, the I.R.S. began offering bigger rewards — 15 percent to 30 percent of whatever money the government recovered — in a move that has turbocharged the agency’s whistle-blower program.
The fresser employers in town who illegally lay off kollel veiber when they get pregnant should take note.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/business/20drug.html
The drug maker Novartis must pay $250 million in punitive damages for discriminating against thousands of female sales representatives over pay, promotion and pregnancy, a federal jury ruled on Wednesday.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/05/18/alexander.who.am.i/
In this country, we force millions of people -- who are largely black and brown -- into a permanent second-class status, simply because they once committed a crime. Once labeled a felon, you are ushered into a parallel social universe. You can be denied the right to vote, automatically excluded from juries and legally discriminated against in employment, housing, access to education and public benefits -- forms of discrimination that we supposedly left behind.
Some tidbits about the Essex on Coney hashgocho.
The issue was that there were products on premises that were outside of the agreed ones between the owner and Rav Babad. The merchandise was discovered where it was blocked by other products, as if to be kept secret from the mashgiach. Rav Babad was clear that he was unaware of anything being "treif", but that the deviations from the arrangements made his hechsher meaningless. I heard this from Rav Babad directly. I also understand that the business is closing - it was losing a lot of money (presumably a victim of the economy downturn), and this was the main reason for closing.
Lawrence Friedman is the brother of Agristar owner Hershey Friedman.
http://www.villagevoice.com/2008-05-13/news/home-alone-mdash-with-medicaid-fraudsters/
This month, Cuomo brought his biggest case yet, charging a Brooklyn firm B&H Healthcare Services, doing business as Nursing Personnel Home Care, with having bilked the state out of at least $30 million in bogus Medicaid billings.
Cuomo filed a criminal indictment alleging grand larceny & fraud against the company & its president, Walter Greenfeld. He simultaneously filed civil suit asking for treble damages ($90 million) & named the officers & shareholders as defendants.
Several shareholders have the same last names—Schreiber & Goldstein—as the principal officers of B&H Photo, the giant camera retailer. Moreover, B&H Home Health Care/Nursing Personnel for some reason paid more than $2 million to B&H Photo.
The complaint goes out of its way to state that B&H Photo is not a shareholder. A lawyer for the defendant said the similar names were a coincidence. B&H Photo didn't return calls.
Then the biggest owner in B&H/Nursing is major political contributor Isaac Yitzchok Schwartz, who lives on Rodney St in Williamsburg.
Schwartz is well known in political circles as a generous donor. He's kept a low profile, but his picture got snapped in 1996 when he showed at LaGuardia Airport with leaders of Williamsburg's Hasidic community to welcome then-presidential candidate Bob Dole & escort him to a fundraiser.
Schwartz & his family donated $4,600—the maximum allowed—to Rudy Giuliani's presidential campaign. Overall, records show that he & his loved ones pumped $97,000 into federal races since 1995. His recipients range from George W. Bush & former senator Al D'Amato to congressman Anthony Weiner & Alabama senator Richard Shelby. Schwartz is also partial to Rhode Island representative Patrick Kennedy, son of Massachussetts senator Ted Kennedy, who received $14,000 from the man & his family.
He's been active in state races, plowing $30,000 into campaigns since 2001. He gave $3,500 to Eliot Spitzer's 2006 gubernatorial campaign, as well as $1,000 to the very man who's suing him—Attorney General Cuomo. But most of his state donations went to former governor George Pataki & other Republicans.
He had good reason to like Pataki. In the '90s, Schwartz joined a team that included major Republican contributors to form a company called CarePlus, which won approvals to participate in the lucrative field of Medicaid managed care. In 2002, Wayne Barrett described how Pataki aides shoehorned the company into the bidding process after it flunked evaluations.
B&H/Nursing Personnel is represented by attorney Randy Mastro, a former Giuliani deputy.
Mastro was the attorney for Lawrence Friedman, who pled guilty in 2001 to Medicaid fraud & agreed to repay $48 million. One thing that made Friedman's case notorious was his entree to Pataki officials was brokered by a pair of Williamsburg men named Joseph Goldberger & Joseph Menczer, who helped raise an astonishing $500,000 for the former governor.
Known as the "Two Josephs," the men are key power brokers for the Williamsburg Orthodox community, and are close allies of Schwartz & B&H/Nursing Personnel. They are also irrepressible. Although it was Spitzer who brought charges against Friedman & helped spotlight the role the men played with Pataki, both Menczer & Goldberger were prominent guests at Spitzer's election celebration & at his inauguration. In a photo in the Daily News, the Two Josephs are seen beaming at Spitzer, his wife & daughters as they descended the capital steps after his inaugural address.
Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo today announced that his office has reached an agreement barring an East Side condominium developer from future sales. The settlement with 250 East Borrower, LLC and its principals, Alexander Gurevich, Gene Kiselman, Eliot Eliyahu Spitzer, and Michael Steinberg, is the result of an investigation of the Alexander Condominium, located at 250 East 49th Street in Manhattan.
Under the terms of the settlement, the developer is required to offer rescission to all purchasers and must pay the state a total of $300,000 in costs, penalties and fee. In addition, developer Alexander Gurevich has been removed from the project and is barred from offering or selling condominiums, cooperatives, or other real estate securities for three years. The developer has also transferred all funds remaining in escrow to an independent escrow agent, and has arranged for independent certification of the projected budget and title insurance.
“Today’s settlement sends a clear message to property developers that deception and double-dealing will not be tolerated,” said Attorney General Cuomo. “Purchasers are entitled to full and honest disclosure and must be able to rely on all representations made to them.”
Starting in September of 2009, the Attorney General’s Office began an investigation of the Alexander Condominium. The investigation revealed, in violation of the Martin Act and the Attorney General’s regulations governing new construction condominiums, that the developer had an undisclosed principal, Alexander Gurevich, who served as the escrow agent for the project, as well as being the sole principal of the mortgage lender and title company recommended by the developer to purchasers. In addition, Mr. Gurevich controlled the company that certified the accuracy of the developer's budget projections.
http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/94554659.html
A prosecutor said Thursday he expects an ongoing criminal probe into alleged embezzlement and tax fraud at the community activist group ACORN to go before an East Baton Rouge Parish grand jury within the next seven months.
At the hearing, state District Judge Tony Marabella ordered a New Orleans firm that provides accounting services to ACORN and a number of ACORN-related entities to turn over subpoenaed documents to the state Attorney General’s Office.
An attorney for the accounting firm Duplantier, Hrapmann, Hogan and Maher told the judge that ACORN and some of its affiliates were asserting an accounting privilege.
“We have documents, but we do not have consent’’ to release them to the state, Beverly Delaune, who represents the accounting firm, told Marabella.
So the judge ordered the firm to produce the records to the state.
Caldwell said afterward the accounting privilege does not apply in the ACORN case because the probe involves alleged tax fraud.
http://www.13wham.com/news/national/story/States-prepare-to-honor-gay-leader/WbF0cl9Hx0GVyQU5glCtFg.cspx
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — California and other states are gearing up to honor Harvey Milk on what would have been the 80th birthday of the slain gay rights leader.
Over the objections of some fellow Republicans, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill last year establishing May 22nd as an annual holiday of sorts that simply encourages public schools to conduct commemorative activities in Milk's honor.
By EILEEN SULLIVAN
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - A new government report says at least 16 known terrorists have passed through U.S. airports where federal officials were trained to spot suspicious behavior.
The Government Accountability Office report says that between May 2004 and August 2008, behavior detection officers who work for the Transportation Security Administration made about 1,100 arrests. None were for terrorism.
Florida Republican Rep. John Mica says behavior detection officers were working at New York's Kennedy airport when the Times Square bomb suspect passed through airport security undetected.
http://biggovernment.com/jhoft/2010/05/18/word-to-obama-daniel-pearl-was-not-beheaded-because-he-was-a-journalist-he-was-beheaded-because-he-was-an-american-and-a-jew/
Word to Obama – Daniel Pearl Was Not Beheaded Because He Was a Journalist. He Was Beheaded Because He Was an American and a Jew
by Jim Hoft
Daniel Pearl was not beheaded because he was a journalist.
Daniel Pearl was beheaded by Islamic extremists because he was an American and a Jew.
“My name is Daniel Pearl, I am a Jewish-American.”
Yesterday Barack Obama signed the toothless Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act of 2009 named in honor of the Wall Street Journal reporter who was killed by terrorists in 2002. The bill promotes press freedom. The president declined to take questions from the media at the signing event.
Jennifer Rubin at Contentions Blog pointed out that Barack Obama forgot to mention that Daniel Pearl was murdered by Islamic extremists.
At a signing ceremony for the Freedom of Press Act, it is ironic and shameful that Obama could not bring himself to identify the killers who beheaded the man who fearlessly reported on the jihadist terrorists.
After the Islamic radicals murdered Daniel Pearl they released a video of his beheading. This text was included:
“My name is Daniel Pearl. I am a Jewish American from Encino, California USA. I come from, uh, on my father’s side the family is Zionist. My father’s Jewish, my mother’s Jewish, I’m Jewish. My family follows Judaism. We’ve made numerous family visits to Israel. Back in the town of Bnei Brak there is a street named after my great grandfather Chaim Pearl who is one of the founders of the town.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/22/nyregion/22judge.html
In his 43-year career as a federal judge, Jack B. Weinstein has come to be identified by his efforts to combat what he calls “the unnecessary cruelty of the law.” His most recent crusade is particularly striking because of the beneficiary: a man who has amassed a vast collection of child pornography.
Judge Weinstein, who sits in the United States District Court in Brooklyn, has twice thrown out convictions that would have ensured that the man spend at least five years behind bars. He has pledged to break protocol and inform the next jury about the mandatory prison sentence that the charges carry. And he recently declared that the man, who is awaiting a new trial, did not need an electronic ankle bracelet because he posed “no risk to society.”
There is little public sympathy for collectors of child pornography. Yet across the country, an increasing number of federal judges have come to their defense, criticizing changes to sentencing laws that have effectively quadrupled their average prison term over the last decade.
Last week, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit vacated a 20-year child pornography sentence by ruling that the sentencing guidelines for such cases, “unless applied with great care, can lead to unreasonable sentences.” The decision noted that the recommended sentences for looking at pictures of children being sexually abused sometimes eclipse those for actually sexually abusing a child.
Judge Weinstein has gone to extraordinary lengths to challenge the strict punishments, issuing a series of rulings that directly attack the mandatory five-year prison sentence faced by defendants charged with receiving child pornography.
“I don’t approve of child pornography, obviously,” he said in an interview this week. But, he also said, he does not believe that those who view the images, as opposed to producing or selling them, present a threat to children.
http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/31994/lawyers-face-%C2%A334m-fraud-investigation
Lawyers face £34m fraud investigation
By Marcus Dysch
Created 21 May 2010 - 2:40pm
Three prominent Jewish lawyer brothers are embroiled in an alleged multi-million pound fraud case in Gibraltar.
London-based Isaac Marrache and his brothers, Benjamin and Solomon, who own and run the Marrache & Co firm, have all been declared bankrupt and face a range of charges.
Benjamin and Solomon, who run the firm's Gibraltar office, were declared bankrupt in early May by Gibraltar's Supreme Court, which claims that the pair have stashed money in Israel and Panama.
The company is now in administration and specialists are investigating claims against it totalling £34 million.
Sources close to the family say the conflict between the brothers over the case has already become "very vicious".
Isaac, of Hampstead Garden Suburb, was declared bankrupt a few days after his brothers having voluntarily returned to Gibraltar from London to answer investigators' questions.
He was then arrested and charged by police. His London branch office has closed with no losses to clients.
Isaac is charged with diverting funds from the law firm's Canadian dollar client account to other accounts under his control between November 2007 and November 2009.
A second charge alleges a property owned by a client of the firm was used by Isaac to fraudulently obtain an overdraft from a local branch.
He has been bailed on condition that he provides £400,000 in sureties and surrenders his travel documents amid fears he might flee the jurisdiction.
Benjamin and Solomon face separate charges of false accounting. They have been remanded in custody in Moorish Castle, a medieval fortification which now houses Gibraltar's main prison, since February.
The case is expected to take around 18 months to be tried in Gibraltar's courts.
Jonathan Goldberg QC, representing Isaac Marrache, said: "He is mortified that the once highly successful and reputable firm he established on his own many years ago has apparently been plundered to the extent that clients have lost their money and loyal employees their jobs.
"The fact that certain close members of his family may be implicated is heartbreaking to him."
Mr Goldberg said his client denied any criminal wrongdoing and had a "very different side of the story to tell".
All of a sudden, Lubavitchers have adopted the minhag Hagr"a to wear tefillin to court to scare the judge in the Rubashkin trial. "Veyaru mimeka" shteit
The Chofetz Chaim said he wanted to find a raaya that the Vilna Gaon's kuntz worked so he looked up the court case in the state archives when he was in Vilna and found that the trial stopped in the middle with the judge throwing out the case.
Could it be it's not working for Rubashkin because these tefillin were written by Meshichist sofrim?
http://blogs.desmoinesregister.com/dmr/index.php/2010/05/21/rubashkin-trial-to-resume-this-afternoon/
Several of Rubashkin’s supporters, who are Hasidic Jews, have been praying before the judge enters the courtroom with tefillin — the black arm and head bands wrapped around their bodies.
Young Israel's Pesach Lerner writes in Mishpacha Magazine to attack the government, arguing that lowering the request to the judge for life in prison to 25 years is just as bad because Rubashkin getting out at 61 to 66 years old (for good behavior) has the same din as a life sentence.
http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2010/05/19/preparing-for-a-role-al-pacino-pays-a-visit-to-borough-park/
Mamash a chutzpah that Italianishe actor Al Pacino was taken to a beis medrash in Boro Park to learn how to imitate shuckling during davening so he can play the part of "Shylock", the stereotyped Jewish character created by the anti-Semite William Shakespeare yemach shmoy.
Eight senators asked the Obama administration Tuesday to open a criminal investigation into BP (British Petroleum) for allegedly making false statements to authorities about the ability to stop a massive oil spill.
This could be a problem soon for yeshivos and this Lubavitcher idyot is not making things any easier.
http://www.lacanadaonline.com/articles/2010/05/20/religion/lvs-intheory052010.txt
Progressive groups are up in arms over reports Friday about the decision of a Roman Catholic school in Massachusetts to rescind the admission of an 8-year-old student because his parents are lesbians.
RABBI SIMCHA BACKMAN is spiritual leader of Chabad of Glendale and the Foothills:
I feel that the decision made by the Catholic elementary school in Massachusetts was wrong and inappropriate for a religious institution. I assume that the St. Paul School rescinded the boy’s admission because of their view that his lesbian parents are living in sin. However, even if the school administration does not approve of a homosexual lifestyle, why should an innocent child suffer as a result? Religious teachings forbid making a child bear the sins of his parents. I was pleased to read that once church officials at the Archdiocese of Boston learned of the school’s action, they pledged to help find a new Catholic school for the boy.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/21/sports/cycling/21landis.html?hp
It's ok if Kolko takes down YTT with him as long as he admits guilt.
"Landis Admits Doping, Accuses Top U.S. Cyclists"
Miss Michigan, Rima Fakih becomes the first Arab-American to be crowned Miss USA. CNN's Lisa Sylvester reports.
http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishFeatures/Article.aspx?id=175875
Reflections of African American women converts.
Meira Leahy also credits her mother for instilling a strong spiritual faith in her that led her on the path to her own journey to Judaism, which began for her nearly 20 years ago at age 23. Leahy, who lives in a Minneapolis suburb with her husband and five kids, leads a frum and observant life. Although she had her bat mitzva after conversion as a Conservative Jew, she later took steps to also convert to Orthodoxy.
Leahy finds that white Jews seem to be the ones who have more issues with the color of her skin or that she is a convert than she or her family have. “Back when I was younger and we were first married, people would mistake me for the babysitter or they would assume my kids were adopted and they’d ask, ‘Where did you get them from.’
Courtenay Edelhart, who is biracial – the product of an African American mother and white father with Jewish ancestry – received support from her family as well. Her mother was raised African Methodist Episcopal but left the church to join the New Age movement long before Edelhart was born. Her mom meditates daily, consults psychics and believes in reincarnation. Edelhart’s paternal grandmother was a Christian Scientist and her paternal grandfather was the Jewish son of a rabbi. Her late father had no formal religious affiliation growing up and identified as an atheist, but converted to Judaism as an adult because his first wife insisted on it as a condition of marriage. The marriage only lasted a short time. He met Edelhart’s mother as he was going through a divorce.
Neither of my parents thought anything at all of entering an interracial, interfaith marriage. They very much wanted my sister and me to think critically and independently, too,” she says.
“When I told my atheist, Jewish-in-name-only father I was converting to Judaism, he laughed and said mischievously, ‘What did I do wrong?’
Edelhart, a single mom who adopted two African American children – a boy and a girl, after giving up on finding a husband (“I am too black for Ashkenazi Jews and too Jewish for Christian blacks,” she quipped), says her children, who underwent conversions by age two – will experience Judaism in a way very different from what she found when she converted as a young adult. Both of her children attended Jewish preschools that were racially diverse. The temple they belong to in California outside L.A. has a female rabbi and congregants who are black, Asian and Latino. Her daughter, seven, will attend Jewish camp this summer for the second year in a row. “She was not the only black child there last year and will not be the only black child there this year,” she says.
Sheree R. Curry, an award-winning journalist and editor of BlackandJewish.com, had a formal conversion to Judaism at the age of 18 and is supported by a mother who encouraged her daughters to choose their own religious identity. She lives in a Minneapolis suburb with her two sons. They frequent events at the local Aish Center
http://dailycaller.com/2010/05/15/pelosi-to-artists-quit-your-jobs-u-s-taxpayers-have-your-health-care/
Nancy Pelosi spoke to musicians and the artistically inclined in Washington DC, and instead of telling those in attendance they should get a job, she brought quite a different message: they needn’t bother working, because the taxpayers of the United States would cover their health care. Perhaps channeling her San Francisco district, Pelosi explained that without a job they would be free to focus on their talents, passions and aspirations because they wouldn’t be “job locked.”
http://bechollashon.org/about/team.php#zarchiBio
Why is the Vaad Hakashrus of Northern California's Rabbi Shlomo Zarchi ...
http://www.bechollashon.org/projects/abayudaya/abayudaya.php
... on staff with this group "Bechol Lashon" that supports the Conservative movement's embrace of Black Africans who claim to be Jewish?
I hope no one will do it to my masters...
http://www.examiner.com/x-41912-Scottsdale-Self-Defense-Examiner~y2010m4d8-A-California-town-proves-murder-is-acceptable-but-is-it-justifiable
After 20 years of sexually and psychologically abuse, Aaron Vargas pulled the trigger on his abuser to prevent his child from becoming the next victim. “The abuser, Darrell McNeill, abused many children in the small community of Fort Bragg, California where he was a local businessman, Boy Scout leader, and Big Brother” writes Mindy Galliani, Vargas’ sister. “The abuse was reported to the police by victims, and by McNeill's former wife, but no investigation was done - McNeill was never even questioned. McNeill stalked and harassed Aaron up until the day he died, even asking to see and to babysit Aaron's child. He harassed other victims as well, including one who committed suicide four years ago.”
Twelve other men have come forward to say that McNeill had also abused them. Some of the victims even notified law enforcement officials, which fell on deaf ears. Therefore, it is almost fair to say that Vargas had no other choice but to rid his community of such a disgusting, immoral scumbag like McNeill, but can murder be justified as self defense in this situation? There is certainly no question as to whether or not the world is a better place without McNeill in it, it is. For those who feel like murder was justified in this case, there is a petition to sign in support of the release of Aaron Vargas from jail.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yermi-brenner/israeli-orthodox-rabbi-se_b_581098.html
Israeli Gay Orthodox Rabbi Seeks Recognition
I see that Ivanka..oh yeah...Yael Trump is still showing quite a bit of skin for someone recently converted by an Orthodox Beis Din.
I know that Rabbi Haskel "the Rascal" Lookstein doesn't give a damn, but Rabbi Hershel Shaechter? I don't get it, I just don't get it.
RHS was duped by Haskel
Lookstein to be a part of
this 'Bais Din'. Haskel was
doing the Donald's bidding.
RHS was simply being used. Shameful!
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