FLORIDA
Miami Herald
BY CHARLES RABIN
crabin@MiamiHerald.com
A substitute rabbi arrested for domestic violence almost two decades ago was charged Thursday with fondling an 11-year-old girl through her clothes and caressing her buttocks at his Miami Beach art gallery.
Police said Steve Karro, 55, placed the child on his lap last month and kissed her on the neck, then touched her bottom. During questioning by police, Karro said he touched the child’s buttocks for “cleansing” reasons because she was exhibiting “negative energy.”
Police said Karro gave her a bag of candy and asked her not to tell her parents about what had happened as she left the studio, 738 Arthur Godfrey Rd., on April 16. Police said the child and Karro knew each other for five years, but officers couldn’t explain why she was at the studio alone.
Karro, a substitute rabbi at the nearby Shaare Ezra Sephardic Synagogue Congregation, was arrested and charged with lewd and lascivious conduct of a child, and molesting a child. Calls to the synagogue and to Karro were not immediately returned Thursday.
Police said there was no indication that Karro did anything wrong while serving there.
Karro’s only previous brush with the law, according to Florida Department of Law Enforcement records, was for beating up his wife in 1999. His wife was also arrested during that encounter, in what was described then as a “knock-down, drag-out fight.”
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