Former Yeshivah centre students tell of sex abuse and ostracism on going public

By Melissa Davey
Guardian
February 2, 2015

http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/feb/02/former-yeshivah-centre-students-tell-of-sex-abuse-and-ostracism-on-going-public

Manny Waks speaks to the media outside the county court in Melbourne.

Former students of the Yeshivah centre in Melbourne have told a royal commission how they were groomed for sexual abuse by staff, then bullied and ostracised by religious leaders when they sought help.

Manny Waks told the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse he had received abusive emails and messages from senior members of the orthodox Jewish community since going public about his abuse in 2011.

One came from Rebbetzin Pnina Feldman, an executive of the Sydney Yeshivah centre, he told the commission at Melbourne’s county court on Monday.

“Just because a security guard molested you, don’t blame Yeshivah,” the email read. “Get over it. I haven’t met a person yet with one nice word to say about you. Most people consider you a low life.”

Waks said his abuse began in 1987, when he was 11, by a man identified only as AVP, who now lives in the US.

He told the commission that he confided in a classmate, who told other students.

“I was taunted and bullied and called gay at school because I had been sexually abused by a man,” he told the commission, breaking down. “I was bullied and taunted in the presence of teachers in school, and others in positions of authority with the Yeshiva centre, but no one acted to stop it.

“No adult ever asked me what was happening and if I was OK.”

From 1988, Waks was abused by David Cyprys, a centre security guard and youth leader. The abuse occurred during kung fu classes held through the Yeshivah centre, and at other locations within the premises, Waks told the commission.

“Due to my initial experience being bullied after sharing my abuse by AVP, I did not even consider sharing my abuse by Cyprys with anyone,” Waks said. “By this time I felt it was my fault – after all, why would two separate, well-known community members sexually abuse me?”

Waks said he first disclosed his abuse to police in 1996 when he was an adult, but was told it was his word against Cyprys’s.

Police made no connection between his case and other complaints against Cyprys, or a case in 1992 in which Cyprys pleaded guilty to indecent assault but no conviction was recorded, Waks said.

Waks told the commission he also reported the abuse to the senior rabbi and director of the Yeshivah centre, Dovid Groner, who made it clear to him that going to secular authorities was frowned upon.

Cyprys continued to work at the school as a security guard, with access to all areas of the centre, until the mid-2000s, the commission heard. Groner died in 2008.

No one in authority from the Yeshivah centre or college had ever personally apologised to him or offered support, Waks said.

Instead, Waks said, he and his family had been shunned by the Yeshivah community since 2011, when he began speaking publicly about his abuse. His parents were moving to Israel to escape their poor treatment, he said, while he and his wife recently moved to Europe.

“It was becoming unbearable, these personal attacks,” Waks told the commission through tears. “All I’ve seen from Yeshivah over the past few decades is ignore the abuse, then cover it up, and then be involved in intimidation and harassment.”

Another victim, known only as AVA, was also a student of the Yeshivah college while Groner was the head of the centre. He told the commission that, like Waks, his abuse at the hands of Cyprys was disclosed to Groner, but nothing was done.

Groner told AVA’s mother he would “look after the situation”.

“We thought we cured him [Cyprys],” Groner said, according to a statement to the commission from AVA’s mother.

But AVA’s abuse continued for another two years, the commission heard.

“At one point [Cyprys] asked me if I knew anyone else who was interested in doing the things we were doing,” AVA told the commission.

He told the commission that as an adult he had been diagnosed with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, and that he had abandoned his religion.

“It is too horrible and incomprehensible to think that there could be an omnipresent being when the world could be so nasty,” he said. “My life spiralled out of control as a result of the sexual abuse.”

The hearings continue.