BishopAccountability.org
 
 

Lawsuit Filed in Georgetown Rabbi Case; Synagogue Severs Relations with Leader

By Peter Hermann
Washington Post
December 2, 2014

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/lawsuit-filed-in-georgetown-rabbi-case-synagogue-severs-relations-with-leader/2014/12/02/4971ff4c-74b7-11e4-a755-e32227229e7b_story.html?tid=pm_local_pop

The Kesher Israel synagogue is seen in Georgetown. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

A lawsuit filed Tuesday against a Georgetown synagogue and others accuses the sanctuary’s authorities of covering up a series of unusual practices of an influential rabbi, which the suit says allowed his alleged secret recordings of women in a ritual bath to go unchecked.

The lawsuit was filed by a Georgetown University Law School student, who accuses the rabbi, 62-year-old Barry Freundel, of luring her to the bath as part of her studies at the school. Among the unusual customs, the suit alleges, were the use of practice dunks before the bath, known as a mikvah, and encouraging non-Jews, unmarried women and students to use the bath as part of their studies, which runs counter to accepted Jewish practices.

Also named in the suit are the National Capital Mikvah, where the baths took place, and Georgetown University Law School, where Freundel taught.

Filed in D.C. Superior Court, the lawsuit seeks class-action status and identifies the plaintiff only as a third-year law student. “This case involves an unfathomable breach of trust by a Georgetown professor and religious leader and defendants’ utter failure to prevent and/or stop it,” Baltimore attorney Steven D. Silverman said in the lawsuit. He also said, “Defendants’ turned a blind eye to obvious signs of Freundel’s increasingly bizarre behavior, ignoring the bright red flags that Freundel was acting inappropriately with women subjected to his authority.”

The suit comes as the board that runs Kesher Israel synagogue and the National Capital Mikvah, the adjacent but separately administered bath, announced that they have terminated their contracts with Freundel, a nationally known arbiter of religious laws and a leader in conversions. He has been asked to vacate the rabbinic residence in Georgetown by Jan. 1. A mikvah is primarily used by people converting to Judaism and by religious women and men observing Jewish laws of ritual purification.

Rabbi Barry Freundel (Courtesy of Washington Jewish Week)

D.C. police arrested Freundel in October and charged him with six counts of voyeurism. Police said they found a camera hidden in a clock radio pointed at a shower in the mikvah. Authorities said that an aide to the bath found the hidden camera. Police seized numerous computer storage devices but have not said if more women have been identified as victims.

Freundel is scheduled for a hearing in D.C. Superior Court Jan. 16.

 

 

 

 

 




.

 
 

Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.