Prosecutors said they need additional time to investigate the case and asked that a new hearing date be set for February 16.
Above: Rabbi Barry Freundel
Trial Of Accused Mikvah Voyeur Rabbi Barry Freundel Delayed For Second Time
Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com
Prosecutors asked and received a postponement today in the case of accused mikvah (ritual bath) voyeur rabbi Barry Freundel, the Washington Post reported.
Freundel was arrested in October and charged with six counts of misdemeanor voyeurism for allegedly using a hidden camera to secretly video record naked women preparing to immerse in the mikvah he controlled. He entered a not guilty plea and could face as much as six years in prison if convicted.
Prosecutors said they need additional time to investigate the case and asked that a new hearing date be set for February 16. DC Superior Court Judge Franklin Burgess Jr. agreed to grant the postponement, the second so far in the case. In November, prosecutors were granted a postponement so they could seek out additional victims.
Freundel and his attorney Jeffrey Harris agreed to the postponement, the Post reported.
About 15 people who sat quietly in the courtroom during the hearing. When it was over, immediately outside they reportedly pulled out signs reading #noplea deal and #safemikvah.
“The mikvah is a safe and sacred place that is important to protect. We do not want to see a plea deal or a slap on the wrist,” 29-year-old Carly Pildis, one of the organizers of the demonstration and a friend of one of Freundel’s alleged victims, told the paper.
Persistent rumors and reports have appeared to indicate that prosecutors would like to exactly what Pildis and the other demonstrators do not want, even though several hidden video recording devices and much other evidence was recovered from Freundel’s home and his office at Towson University where he taught.
Freundel was one of the top Modern Orthodox rabbis in North America and the top rabbi at the Modern Orthodox Kesher Israel synagogue in DC’s tony Georgetown neighborhood for a quarter century until he was fired by the synagogue effective January 1 as a result of his arrest.
The mikvah is located adjacent to Kesher Israel. Based on evidence recovered and other information, it is likely that more than 100 women were secretly video recorded there. Some of these women may be students of Freundel from Towson who were encouraged by Freundel to visit the mikvah and try it out for the experience. In the same way, Freundel encouraged females preparing to convert to Judaism to do “practice dunks” in his mikvah so that when the time for the conversion ceremony and its requisite immersion came, they would be familiar with the process.
There is nothing in Jewish law that encourages or recommends “practice dunks,” immersion by never-married single women is discouraged by normative Orthodox rabbis, and non-Jews are not in any way encouraged to use mikvahs outside of the conversion ceremony itself.
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