Like many of Freundel’s conversion candidates, she was asked to do hours of unpaid administrative work in his home office until late in the evening. She spent hours taking dictation from him, including of his personal emails, even writing his recommendations for college students. All of this took place in his home office, where sometimes “he would lie on his bed with his laptop, and I would have to go talk to him. It was really creepy. He would also eat and drink in front of me and not even offer me a glass of water.”
In Ha'aretz, Allison Kaplan Sommer has long, detailed report on how mikavh voyeur Rabbi Barry Freundel's voyeurism effects his victims now, even after he was sentenced to 6-1/2 years and imprisoned.
In it is one woman's story about how she warned the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA) about Freundel's other issues several years before. But despite this, and despite having corroborating evidence, the RCA did nothing to stop Freundel. Neither did his Modern Orthodox Kesher Israel synagogue located in the tony Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, DC.
Here's that excerpt:
…[Kate] Bailey’s relationship with Freundel began eight years ago when, as a 20-year-old college student, she walked into Freundel’s office at Kesher Israel, also known as the Georgetown synagogue for its downtown Washington, D.C. location, and told him she wanted to convert to Judaism. At first, she said, she appreciated his analytical and intellectual style, which suited her better than some of the “more spiritual,” “touchy-feely” rabbis she had encountered. But his subsequent behavior, both during the conversion process and afterward, made her feel exploited and uncomfortable, she said.
Like many of Freundel’s conversion candidates, she was asked to do hours of unpaid administrative work in his home office until late in the evening. She spent hours taking dictation from him, including of his personal emails, even writing his recommendations for college students. All of this took place in his home office, where sometimes “he would lie on his bed with his laptop, and I would have to go talk to him. It was really creepy. He would also eat and drink in front of me and not even offer me a glass of water,” Bailey related. He never touched her or made direct sexual advances, but he once commented on her appearance and she knew he had made inappropriate comments to other women, she said.
Her mikveh immersion itself, a mandatory part of the conversion process in Orthodox and Conservative Judaism, was also unsettling, Bailey recalls, though at the time she didn’t know why. When she completed her conversion, in August 2008, she wasn’t asked to perform “practice dunks” beforehand like some other converts, but afterward she was asked to “redunk” in an unusual manner.
“In 2009, a couple months after my conversion, Freundel called me and said there was a problem with the mikveh on the day of your conversion. He didn’t say I had to, but he said if I wanted to be sure, to cross your t’s and dot your i’s, then I should do it.” He told her “something had been wrong with the mikveh that day” but didn’t say what, Bailey recalled. He said, “I can’t tell you about it, you shouldn’t tell anyone either, it can affect people’s reputations in the community.” Again, she felt “creeped out,” but she decided to go ahead because she wanted her conversion to be unquestioned. When she reported to the mikveh at the appointed time, she saw Freundel had not reconvened the traditional panel of rabbis to witness the “redunk,” and while he was present at the facility, he did not see her re-immersion himself. Only the attendant was present. “I could never get an explanation for the “redunk,” Bailey related. It was only after Freundel was charged and she was told that she was in his “catalogue” of videos that it all made sense to her. The purpose of the “redunk” was to get her on tape.
The last straw came much later, when she was a member of the synagogue and Freundel called her. It wasn’t the first time, Bailey said: He “kept tabs” on her observance of Judaism and called to check on her when he noticed she had not been to the synagogue for a while. He also, she said, had “spies” who reported to him when it appeared his converts might not be adhering to Orthodox practice such as keeping kosher and observing Shabbat.
At first, she said, she thought he was calling to ask her to do more unpaid secretarial work, as he had with other converts. He wasn’t; instead, he wanted money. He asked her if “it was important” to her that the Israeli rabbinate recognize her conversion, and said that if it was she should donate $1,000 to his conversion court. When she explained to him that she was in graduate school and didn’t have that kind of money to give, he quickly backed off. But when she hung up, she said, she asked herself, “Did he just basically say that if I want my conversion recognized, I should give him $1,000?” It wasn’t clear.
That was when she decided to complain to the RCA, detailing the exploitation of her labor, the inappropriate comments about her appearance, the “redunk” and the fundraising attempt. The senior official that she spoke to seemed most perturbed by the fundraising but took no issue with the “redunk,” assuring her that “it was probably fine” and that there was surely a halakhic reason for it.
The RCA told her to submit a formal complaint that included her name and a statement. Later she was told that in order to back up her story she would have to find other women who had similar experiences and encourage them to complain as well.
“I did,” Bailey said, and nothing happened. “They kept telling me, it’s so great, no one would come forward by name in the past, you are so brave ... and then, after telling me how great and brave I was, they kind of dropped off the face of the earth.” The RCA did not respond to requests for comment.
She also spoke to the president of the congregation, informing her of the complaint to the RCA and why she felt that she could no longer be a member of Kesher Israel: “I couldn’t continue to pay his salary in good conscience.”…
While most of Freundel’s shocking offenses were detailed in the prosecution memo, and the women in the [private] Facebook [group of his victims] had learned from each other about his various modi operandi, there were nevertheless some revelations in the courtroom. They discovered that…Freundel had surreptitiously filmed vulnerable women in other locations as well.…Freundel was aware that many of his female converts had suffered sexual abuse in the past and had to have known that if his abuse of them was revealed, it would open old wounds.…
Of course, Freundel was the RCA's point man on conversion to Judaism for several years and sat on its executive while these complaints against him were made to the RCA, which failed to act.
Read the whole article here.
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