Fact Aviv Kellner 11 10 14.L [Print].Indd

A REPORTER AT LARGE THE OUTCAST After a Hasidic man exposed child abuse in his tight-knit Brooklyn community, he found himself the target of a criminal investigation. BY RACHEL AVIV They have their own emergency medical corps, a security patrol, and a rabbinic court system, which can handle criminal allegations. PHOTOGRAPH BY CHRISTOPHER ANDERSON TNY—2014_11_10—PAGE 45—133SC.—LIVE ART—R25734—PLEASE PULL VIRTUAL PROOF—EXTREMELY CRITI- CAL PHOTOGRAPH TO BE WATCHED THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE PRESS RUN 4c am Kellner’s reputation in the Ha- sidic community of Borough Park, Brooklyn,S began to suer in 2008, when his teen-age son told him that he had been molested by a man who had prayed at their synagogue. Kell- ner’s first instinct was to run the man over with his van, but he didn’t know if his anger was justified. Molestation was rarely discussed in the community, and it didn’t seem to Kellner that any of the prohibitions in the Ten Com- mandments explicitly related to it. The most relevant sins—adultery and cov- eting a neighbor’s belongings—didn’t capture the depth of the violation. Kellner couldn’t pinpoint what was lost when a child was sexually abused, since the person looked the same af- terward. But he sensed that molestation was damaging, because he knew a few victims, and they had gone o the derech, or religious way. “They became dead-enders, lost souls, outcasts,” he told me. Kellner, a heavyset man with hazel eyes and a long, graying beard, never spoke about sexual matters with his six children. They would take classes about the human body (with a focus on how to get pregnant) only after their mar- riages were arranged. Kellner took his son to a modesty committee, called vaad hatznius, which enforces stan- dards of sexual propriety among Bor- ough Park’s hundred thousand ul - tra-Orthodox Jews, the majority of them Hasidic. Vaad hatznius disciplines residents who freely express their sexu- ality or behave lewdly. In a community where non-procreative sex is considered shameful, molestation tends to be regarded in roughly the same light as having an aair. When children com- plain about being molested, the council almost never notifies the police. In- stead, it devises its own punishments for oenders: sometimes they are com- pelled to apologize, pay restitution, or move to Israel. Kellner had once been a top admin- istrator at the Munkacz synagogue and yeshiva, in Borough Park, but he had fought with other leaders about financial and educational policies. He had left the job and started a toner business, collecting discarded car- tridges and reselling them. His son’s MAGNUM alleged abuser, Baruch Lebovits, was In exchange for political support, Brooklyn politicians give Hasidim latitude to police themselves. 44 THE NEW YORKER, NOVEMBER 10, 2014 TNY—2014_11_10—PAGE 44—133SC—LIVE ART—R25734—PLEASE PULL VIRTUAL PROOF—EXTREMELY CRITI- CAL PHOTOGRAPH TO BE WATCHED THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE PRESS RUN 4c the descendant of a rabbinic dynasty, trusts secular government, it parti- not to think about the incident again. a prominent cantor with twenty-four cipates fully in the democratic process. Litwin found the boy’s “claims to grandchildren. Kellner told vaad hatz- Hasidim typically vote as a bloc, deliv- be extremely credible,” he wrote in an nius that he wanted to report his son’s ering tens of thousands of votes to the adavit. But he told Kellner that the abuse to the police, because he didn’t politicians their leaders endorse. In crime was a misdemeanor, and that it trust that the issue could be dealt with exchange for the community’s loyalty, was unlikely that Lebovits, a first-time internally. politicians have given Brooklyn’s Hasi- oender, would receive jail time. Disap- The committee granted him per- dim wide latitude to police themselves. pointed, Kellner said that Lebovits had mission, as long he had the approval of They have their own emergency medi- molested other boys, too. “O.K., so help a rabbi. The rabbi would have to make cal corps, a security patrol, and a rab- me find them,” Litwin told him. an exception to the Tal- binic court system, which mudic prohibition against often handles criminal ellner went back to the modesty mesirah, the act of turning allegations. council and was given the name over another Jew to civil Kellner sought counsel ofK another boy, Joshua, who had com- authorities. According to from Rabbi Chaim Flohr, plained about Lebovits. (All victims’ some interpretations of the leader of an institute names have been changed.) Joshua said Talmudic law, a Jew who where rabbinic scholars that, starting in 2000, when he was informs on another Jew study how the teachings twelve, Lebovits sometimes drove along- has committed a capital of the Torah translate to side him while he was walking to school, crime. He is a “wicked man,” who has contemporary dilemmas. After listen- honking his horn and encouraging “blasphemed and rebelled against the ing to Kellner’s story, Flohr called the him to get into the car, where Lebovits law of Moses,” the twelfth-century modesty councils in Borough Park and performed oral sex on him. Joshua Torah scholar Maimonides wrote. The Williamsburg (where there are sixty said that, on other occasions, Lebovits law was meant to protect the commu- thousand Hasidim) to see if other chil- molested him in the mikvah, a ritual nity from anti-Semitic governments. dren had reported being molested by bath that was in the basement of his Kellner said, “The way history tells it is Lebovits. Flohr wrote in an adavit synagogue. that if a Jew was arrested he was thrown that “numerous complaints and allega- Joshua had gone to a yeshiva for stu- in jail and never heard of again.” tions of a similar nature had been made dents with developmental disabilities. Hasidim, whose movement emerged against Baruch Lebovits dating back His family was poor, and he begged for in the eighteenth century as a mystical, over a long period of time.” Flohr told charity outside synagogues and wed- populist alternative to traditional Juda- Kellner that he was justified in going dings, a common practice in Borough ism, are defined in part by their concern to the police, because Lebovits could Park, where the poorest members of the for self-preservation. Kellner is the be considered a rodef, or pursuer, some- Hasidic community live and pray next son of Hungarian Holocaust survivors one who is endangering the lives of to the wealthiest. They patronize the who re-created in Brooklyn a commu- other Jews. In a letter, Flohr wrote, same businesses on Thirteenth Avenue, nity that had been destroyed by the war. “Behold I make known in the public a commercial strip of kosher restaurants Men dress in black frock coats; married arena: to praise an honest man, namely and shops. Although Kellner had never women wear long skirts and hide their Mr. Shloma Aron Kellner, may his met Joshua, he drove to his house and hair, which is considered alluring, under light shine, that how he acted in re- oered him work helping to plan the shawls or wigs. They speak Yiddish, and gards to the government was based on wedding of a mutual acquaintance. Kell- resist television, the Internet, and other a query before a rabbinic court and was ner gradually steered the conversation secular forms of entertainment. Hasidic done according to our Holy Torah. toward Baruch Lebovits, and urged parents take literally the Lord’s order to It is forbidden to trouble him or hu- Joshua to report his abuse. Joshua be- “be fruitful and multiply”—they intend miliate him.” came jittery and hyper. “Listen, unless to replenish a culture devastated by the With the rabbi’s approval, Kellner you go to the authorities, you’ll never Holocaust—and Hasidim are now the took his son, whom I’ll call Yossel, to feel relaxed,” Kellner told him. “You’ll fastest-growing segment of the Jewish the oces of the Brooklyn Special never feel unviolated.” population in New York City. Sixty per Victims Unit, in Crown Heights, to On March 6, 2008, Joshua told De- cent of the city’s Jewish children, many speak with Steven Litwin, the senior tective Litwin that he had been mo- of them Hasidic, live in Orthodox detective. A studious and introspec- lested by Lebovits on more than thirty homes. tive boy, Yossel explained that Lebovits occasions over four years. Once, he Kellner, who was a member of a had oered him a ride home from a said, Lebovits had picked him up on synagogue that is closely aliated with school outing late at night, then reached his way to school and anally raped him the Satmar sect, the largest Hasidic over to the passenger seat and mo- in a building near his yeshiva. After community in New York, wasn’t sure lested him. He said that Lebovits was each encounter, Lebovits apologized that the prohibition against mesirah soon moaning and grunting. He told and promised he would never do it made sense in a country where, he said, his teacher what had happened, but again. “the justice system is credible enough.” the teacher said that Lebovits was a Five days later, Baruch Lebovits was Although the Satmar community dis- “respected person” and instructed him arrested in front of his house. Although 46 THE NEW YORKER, NOVEMBER 10, 2014 TNY—2014_11_10—PAGE 46—133SC—LIVEART—R25727C.—PLEASE USE VIRTUAL PROOF bw Joshua’s name wasn’t publicly released, when Kellner urged him to report his “Don’t be crazy!” Kellner shouted.

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