TRENTON, N.J. — Three New York men were sentenced Thursday, after pleaded guilty to trying to coerce a Jewish man to give his wife a religious divorce.
U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman said Thursday Avrohom Goldstein, of Brooklyn, was sentenced to three years and nine months in prison. Ariel Potash, of Monsey, New York, got a sentence of one year and two months, and Sholom Schuchat, of Brooklyn, was sentenced to time served.
All three pleaded guilty earlier to one count each of crossing state lines to commit extortion.
The men were arrested along with seven others after the FBI raided several locations in October 2013, including Yeshiva Shaarei Torah in Suffern, a home in Brooklyn and at least one other location in New Jersey.
The raid followed an undercover sting.
Jewish law mandates that a husband present his wife with a document, known as a “get,” to make divorce official.
Prosecutors said the team used brutal methods, including handcuffs and electric cattle prods, to torture men into granting gets.
Rabbi Mendel Epstein, of Lakewood, New Jersey, was convicted of conspiracy to commit kidnapping and acquitted of attempted kidnapping in April. Rabbi Martin Wolmark pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit extortion. Both will be sentenced next month.
Another co-defendant, Moshe Goldstein, 32, was sentenced to four years in prison in the case earlier this week.
I am an observant Orthodox Jew,
it makes me throw up to to see that our very own leaders and mentors that supposedly we should look up to are such crooks and criminals, the scum of the earth, they don’t represent our beliefs and our religion regardless who they are.
or how they portray themselves and dress. They deserve the maximum punishment. yes I am happy that justice was served because this is what they deserve, save no mercy on them, this is not the belief of our religion or our Torah.( Bible).
Although many people have viewed them as holy saints, but they are garbage, the lowest of the lowest.
it saddens me, as well as the entire Jewish community to know that Rabbi Mendel Epstein was a fraud and a faker. unfortunately it does happen, in every walk of life, however they don’t represent our beliefs and our views.
A man like this should serve in jail and rot in jail, he does not belong among Society, needless to say the Jewish community society, and if anybody tells you otherwise, then they are guilty of the same crime.
I hope this She’ll be a lesson and teach a lesson to others not to entertain and idea like this ever again.
respectfully submitted
Aaron