Sex abuse victims treated as 'outcasts': Royal Commission report on Jewish groups

By Rachel Browne
Sydney Morning Herald
November 29, 2016

http://www.smh.com.au/national/sex-abuse-victims-treated-as-outcasts-royal-commission-report-on-jewish-groups-20161129-gszvar.html

The Yeshiva Centre at Bondi. Photo by Ben Rushton

Daniel Robert Hayman leaving court in 2014.

Members of Australia's close-knit ultra-Orthodox Jewish community were discouraged from reporting child sexual abuse because they feared being cast out, a royal commission has found.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse released its report into Yeshiva Bondi and Yeshivah Melbourne on Tuesday, following a public hearing last year.

According to the report, survivors of child sexual abuse were treated as "outcasts after it had become known that they had reported their experiences of child sexual abuse to secular authorities."

"The royal commission found the evidence strongly suggested that ... some members of those communities were discouraged from reporting," the report stated.

"The royal commission also found that there was a marked absence of supportive leadership for survivors of child sexual abuse and their families within Yeshivah Melbourne and that the leadership did not create an environment conducive to the communication of information about child sexual abuse."

Testimony from the hearing in February 2015 led to the resignation of a number of senior rabbis.

Yeshivah Melbourne tightened child protection measures, including drafting formal policies and giving detailed training to children, parents and staff, the commission found.

The commission said it was "unclear" what measures Yeshiva Bondi has taken in implementing child protection measures. Fairfax Media has contacted Yeshiva Bondi for comment.

The public inquiry heard evidence about former Yeshiva volunteer Daniel Robert Hayman, who was found guilty in 2014 of indecently assaulting a teenage boy.

The commission was told that a Jewish law, known as mesirah, forbids a Jew informing on another Jew to a secular authority but the rabbinical Council of Victoria had advised that child sexual abuse should be reported.

Yeshiva Bondi and Yeshivah Melbourne will be the subject of a further inquiry into their current child protection policies and procedures in March next year.