Alleged serial pedophile Malka Leifer ordered released to house arrest

https://www.timesofisrael.com/alleged-serial-pedophile-malka-leifer-ordered-released-to-house-arrest/

A court on Wednesday ordered that an Israeli woman wanted in Australia for alleged serial crimes of pedophilia be released to house arrest.

The ruling by Jerusalem District Court Judge Ram Vinograd came a week after a judge at the same court cast doubt on the evidence against Malka Leifer and ordered the convening of a psychiatric panel to determine whether she is feigning mental illness to avoid extradition.

At the request of prosecutors, Vinograd agreed to put off Leifer’s release to her sister’s home in Bnei Brak until Friday.

Leifer, 52, faces 74 counts of child sex abuse from her time as the principal of the Adass Israel girls’ school in Melbourne. Australia filed for extradition in 2014, but the process has stalled several times, with a district psychiatrist changing his legal opinions regarding Leifer’s mental fitness, allegedly due to pressure from Deputy Health Minister Yaakov Litzman.

Kol V’oz, an organization that combats child abuse in Jewish communities around the globe, condemned the ruling as “an absolute travesty” and said it brought “shame” on Israel.

“Malka Leifer will now be released to the care of her sister at an address within around 500 meters of two schools and six synagogues,” it said in a statement.

“If Leifer is genuinely unwell, she should be held in a medical facility or jail where she can be appropriately cared for until her extradition to Australia is approved.”

Dassi Erlich, one of Leifer’s accusers, said she was left “reeling” by the ruling, which she described as a “massive betrayal of justice.”

Leifer was recruited from Israel to work at the Adass Israel ultra-Orthodox girls school in Melbourne In 2000. When allegations of sexual abuse against her surfaced eight years later, members of the school board purchased the mother of eight a plane ticket back to Israel, allowing her to avoid being charged.

After authorities in Melbourne filed charges against her, Australia officially filed an extradition request in 2012. Two years later, Leifer was arrested in Israel but released to house arrest shortly thereafter.

Judges deemed her mentally unfit to stand trial and eventually removed all restrictions against her, concluding that she was too ill to even leave her bed.

She was rearrested in February 2018 following a police undercover operation that cast doubts on her claims regarding her mental state, and has remained in custody since. The operation was launched after the Jewish Community Watch organization hired private investigators who placed hidden cameras in Emmanuel, a Haredi settlement in the northern West Bank where Leifer had been living, that showed the alleged sex abuser roaming around the town without any apparent difficulty.

Three Jerusalem district psychiatrists determined in legal opinions submitted to the court that Leifer has been feigning mental illness, but the chief district psychiatrist, Dr. Jacob Charnes, has changed his determination three times and most recently recommended that a new psychiatric panel be convened to make an updated determination.