Borough Park, NY – A man engaged in a $400,000 extortion plot against a Brooklyn rabbi’s wealthy family paid a fraudulent witness to falsely claim that the rabbi had molested the witness as a child, prosecutors alleged Wednesday.
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Samuel Kellner was awaiting arraignment on attempted larceny, perjury and other charges in a twisted case that has scandalized a tight-knit orthodox Jewish neighborhood and left the rabbi behind bars.
“Child abuse has to be prosecuted vigorously, but we also have to be careful about false complaints,” District Attorney Charles Hynes said in announcing the arrest.
An indictment alleges that Kellner learned in 2008 that a young man had accused the rabbi, Baruch Lebovits, of sex abuse. Kellner then cooked up a scheme to pay a second man $10,000 to lie and claim molestation as well, prosecutors allege.
Kellner, 49, also was charged with threatening to produce more alleged victims unless Lebovits’ family paid him $400,000. The rabbi owned a travel agency and his son is a successful businessman.
When the family refused to pay, Kellner allegedly persuaded a third young man to come forward. His story resulted in further charges against the rabbi.
The third victim testified last year at a trial where a jury found Lebovits guilty of committing criminal sexual acts. He was sentenced to the maximum prison term of about 10 1/2 year to 32 years.
Lebovits was expected to use the new development to seek bail and challenge his conviction. There was no immediate response to a phone message left with his attorney.
Prosecutors said Wednesday that they believe the original victim and third man who came forward were legitimate, and that they would fight an appeal. The second witness — the one Kellner is accused of paying — didn’t testify at the rabbi’s trial.
“We continue to support the conviction,” Hynes said.
If convicted, Kellner faces up to 21 years in prison. The name of his attorney was not immediately available.
this is massive if true.. all the sex activist have suffered a major set back.. no one is going to believe anyhting anymore on such issues.
now many people will claim many abuse claims are false. this makes a issue even worse off.
PS cases like this is very rare, and this guy who is being accused of bribing also must go to trial to see if it is really true. Maybe he is being set up by the convicted abuser son to get his father released.
I do not know but this is going to be one big mess
The truth is coming out, finally.
Are we talking about BML here? Wow this is huge.
We are yiden. #1 how can you put somone In jail. Did you ever call him to din torah? Burech hashem its comming out the truth this person that was sentince I know him well its not true and now we hope for his discharge shortly iyh
like bob grant said…its sick and getting sicker….
Let’s hope he’ll be able to sing on Passover “Chaad Gadyu” outside of the “Chaad Gadyu”
#10 Just because we are “yiden” doesn’t mean you don’t belong in jail if you are guilty. You are putting other people’s lives at stake if you leave them free to continue their crimes. If it had happened to your child, you wouldn’t be speaking like this.
What the article clearly does not mention is if the tampered wittness had any effect on the conviction & if his testimony was the reason for conviction. .
If that’s the case its possible nothing will change.
Kein Yoyvdi Kol Hagoyim….There is no reason in the world why the judge sentenced him to 32 years in prison…He was foung guilty of 8 counts which carry the minium of 6-48 months on each count..She threw the books on him for the maximum and did not
buy the defense that this guy who accused him is a JUNKIE drug addict…The only reason the gave him the maximum is because he did not want to plead guilty on a charge he denied ..Now that the truth is coming out let me see if she will reverse her decision ,release him for Yom Tov and dismiss all charges against him….
This guy who was arrested has a very bad record here in Boro Park and is ulil for shefiches dumim just to make a buck….Finally his true colors will come out…
dear friends, we have no gurantees ,g-d forbid we can “all” have children who are molestors or molested ,so when thinking about these issues put yourself in both positions as either your child chas vshalom being the molestor or the molested and then you will have a deeper understanding of these very painful occurences,please think a at least a minute before responding
It seems like no one is getting the point here. The main thing we get out of this (if it’s true) is that when someone is accused of abuse there’s no concrete evidence needed and the burden of proof lies on the accused rather than on the accuser.
Wow…. so on this minimal information people will declare Baruch Lebovits innocent. Unbelievable.
It is highly conceivable that Kellner was nothing more than an opportunistic extortionist who saw this case as an opportunity to commit his despicable crime.
From what I’m told, the original complaining victim was a drug addict. Drug abuse is a common coping mechanism for those who have been sexually abused and no claim should EVER Be dismissed on those grounds. Also, abusers TARGET troubled teens. They tell them “I’m a respected Rav. Nobody will believe you….”, and as we see from some of the posts above, they are absolutely RIGHT.
One should not automatically dismiss the original victim. Just because Kellner was an extortionist, it does not make Lebovits innocent.
Let’s wait for the rest of the facts to come out here.
sof ganev letlieh
All activist that are at least half normal should disassociate themselves from the other maniacs like the guy with the hot-line who was a big force in bringing this Kelner guy, the issue of child abuse is is a real serious cause, but with Meshgayim running the show, no one is going to come forward, or believe anything anymore.. its doomed…
Apparently there is one real victim, who brought the original charges. The question is whether the piece of toeiva in jail will get off because of an even bigger piece of toeiva who tried to make a quick buck. And what really will be interesting is if someone else is behind the profiteering toieva.
Abuse is a real problem and it needs to be dealt with by real experts who care only about the victims. Other than Rav Horowitz amus”h and perhaps Meyer Appel, no one professional is dealing with it in the right way. You have the enablers on one side and the fryouts/left wingers who want to discredit all of Yiddishkeit on the other side. There is only one Rav Horowitz but someone else must be out there who isn’t afraid to deal with things the right way.
I have evidence that there was similar bribery and witnes tampering in the weingarten case
bh the rabbi is on his way home