Meir Pogrow: The defense given by a talmid of Pogrow and my rebuttal

I am publishing this letter I received recently because it contains a number of mistaken beliefs which seem to be widely shared. I am also adding responses to the letter writer's claims in the hope that it will educate people what actually happened. My information comes from sources close to the case. My response is in the indented paragraphs.

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Hi Rabbi Eidensohn

I consider myself a talmud of Rabbi Meir since i listen to his shiurim. i know him for over twenty years. I have worked with him on one project of harbatzas hatorah and know many people that are frum today due to him.

Regarding the accusations against him i understand you have posted a psak bais din. and i read it with great pain. i understand your job is to protect the public, the abused from the abuser.

My problem is with you. Since ive read some of the cases you have posted, one of them a relative of mine, you have provided both sides to be able to prove or disprove any evidence.

What has transpired here based on what i read is Tamara Schoor wrote a post facebook accusing someone with a chazkas kashrus. according to her post she went to rabbis five years ago. it took the rabbis over five years to come out with a statement a psak din (after she went public they went public) also in jpost. Jerusalem Post he responds about bais din.

That's simply a mistaken assumption. It isn't true that the rabbis were twiddling their thumbs for 5 years before they decided to act on her complain. It isn't true that Tamara Schoor had been pressuring rabbis for 5 years and they cruelly and irresponsibly refused to act until she went public. This is simply base slander. There is actually very little connection between Tamara Schoor and what Beis Din did. No matter what happens , someone can always ask why didn't it happen before. The fact is there were factors that came together now that didn't exist before. It took the time it needed to take - and not a second more.

Rav Shafran is a top-of the line Dayan in Israel who is well acquainted with what goes on and in addition knows perfect English. The other 2 Dayanim have about 30 years Dayanus experience--each. They have a solid reputation for competence and responsibility - despite what some bloggers and kvetches want to claim. The remaining rabbonim that signed on to the psak are all world-famous.What happened is very painful to some people, but let's not grasp at straws to create a conspiracy theory of rabbinic evil.

If it took the bais din and rabbis five years, or they have very little evidence, or too much but the rabbis covered this up for five years. regardless we have a problem.

How can an intelligent person,who claims he is ehrlich, make such a nonsensical claim while knowing NOTHING about what transpired. Please reread what I wrote above. There was no rabbinic cover up. It was not possible to deal effectively with the problem until now - despite what some bloggers without any proof claim. Instead of trusting some bloggers - and others with an agenda against rabbis with little or no information - to say that there was an conspiracy to do nothing - try and trust the rabbis who actually took care of the matter when they say that there was no way of doing this earlier. Saying more would violate promises of confidentiality. Just as there were bloggers and others in the community who suspected what was going on - but made no public outcry, there were rabbis who also suspected but were unable to bring about the necessary change until now.

Like Goldilocks and the three bears, there was neither too much evidence, nor too little-- but juuuuuuuuust riiiiight when the beis din issued its psak - but not before.

Ether way i believe your doing this lshem shumayim as i see your writing about rabanim and cases that others stay away from. the minimum i expected from you is to give R' Meir a chance to respond before posting. it might be too late since his life is destroyed anyways he has no other job skills other then torah having posted over six thousand shiurim and close to half a million sheilos on mishna and rambam calling him a rasha etc.in a public forum is very irresponsible.

Meir's life is destroyed because of  his horrible deeds, not because of what anyone else did in response

May it be a kappara for the lives he destroyed (after he does teshuvah)

I hope and pray this chilul hasham is false.

It is too late for your hope and prayers - the damage and the chilul haShem already exist.

How to get help if you are an abuse victim or want to help someone who is

Emes wrote:

RDE, I have no first hand knowledge of this matter and do not know Pogrow or any of the victims. However, while I am glad that batei din are acting to protect the victims I am troubled by two questions. (1) if he is truly such an evil person why wasn't he reported to the police? (2) How does the general public know which beis din or organization we should respect and who we should recognize as being corrupt or misguided? Is Rabbi Malinowitz more reputable than Rabbi Kaminetzky? Are organizations dealing with abuse more trustworthy than those dealing with agunot - or more accurately how do we know which one is on the up and up and which is promoting some radical non-halachic agenda?

1) reporting to the police requires that the victims or someone who has first hand knowledge do the reporting. Apparently the victims were not going to the police or they had no way of proving their claims. The police don't want to waste their time with a case which can not get a conviction. A young woman claiming she was seduced and a rabbi denying it doesn't make a good case.

2) Yes Rabbi Malinowitz is more reputable than Rabbi Kaminetsky. As to where to go there are a number of organization which can guide the victims. as to which rabbis to speak to and which policemen are helpful as well as which social agency and how to get therapy if required.

The Beis Din had recommended that victims contact Maaneh 

Maaneh - a Beit Shemesh organization run by my nephew Rabbi Shmuel Zalman Eidensohn. 

email is al@maaneh.org
phone 077 228 b5817
Hotline 077 228 5814
Website www.maaneh.orgsee my post on  Maaneh 

There are other reliable organization that deal with this issue -

Jewish Community Watch an American organization has a branch in Israel

contact Shana Aaronson for assistance Victims Services- Israel Office

Office: 02-544-4766 From the U.S.: 718-841-7056 #118
www.jewishcommunitywatch.org

Magen also in Beit Shemesh is another reliable and competent organization run by Miriam Friedman

contact: 

Email: Hotline@MagenProtects.org

02.9999.678  (from Outside of Israel: +972 2 9999.678)http://magenprotects.org/contact/

Amudim in New York run by Tzvi Gluck 

Contact:

TEL | 646-517-0222
FAX | 646-517-0221

https://amudim.org 

Jeremy Reichberg is at the center of the NYPD's corruption trial

CBS News   Charges brought against four men arrested Monday in a widening New York City corruption probe include lurid claims that a top police official roomed with a prostitute during a Las Vegas trip as businessmen spent over $100,000 to ensure uniformed officers were available as their private security force.

Two high-ranking New York Police Department officials and a police sergeant who oversaw gun license applications were among the latest arrests in a case that has cast a cloud over the nation's largest municipal police force. The men are charged in "two separate and serious criminal schemes," Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the southern district of New York, said Monday.

Those arrested Friday include NYPD Deputy Chief Michael Harrington, Deputy Inspector James Grant, and Sgt. David Villanueva. Grant and Harrington are accused of accepting lavish bribes from Brooklyn businessman Jeremy Reichberg and another businessman. Reichberg, Harrington and Grant were each charged with conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud.

Another officer arrested Monday was David Villanueva, an NYPD sergeant assigned to the department's gun license bureau. He was charged with conspiracy to commit bribery and accused of accepting cash, liquor and limo rides to push through the approval of gun license applications. A fourth NYPD officer, Richard Ochetal, has pleaded guilty to the same allegation, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of New York. They say Ochetal is cooperating with federal investigators.

A criminal complaint accompanying the latest charges alleged Reichberg exploited his connections within the police department to arrange arrests, speed up gun application processing, make tickets disappear, obtain police escorts for him and his friends, get assistance from uniformed personnel to resolve personal disputes and boost security at religious sites and events.

Susan Necheles, Reichberg's lawyer, said in an email: "Mr. Reichberg did not commit a crime."

Reichberg's "only mistake," Necheles said, was befriending a government cooperator "who is desperately trying to get others in trouble in order to curry favor with prosecutors and save his own skin." Reichberg's friend, an unidentified businessman, pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit honest services fraud, and is providing information to federal investigators "in hopes of leniency when he is sentenced," the criminal complaint says.

The complaint said Reichberg managed to use connections to local law enforcement agencies to shut down a lane of the Lincoln Tunnel connecting New Jersey and Manhattan and obtain a police escort for a businessman visiting the U.S.

In return, the businessman showered his favored police officials with well over $100,000 in benefits from 2012 to 2015, including free flights and hotel rooms, prostitutes, expensive meals, home improvements and prime seats at sporting events, the complaint said.

In announcing the arrests, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said Reichberg and the unidentified friend exchanged bribes for "'cops on call,' a private police for themselves and their friends." 

The complaint said Harrington and an unidentified police chief let a businessman buy dinner once or twice a week for 18 months at expensive Manhattan restaurants, where bills ran $400 to $500.

Andrew Weinstein, Harrington's lawyer, said the charges against his client were politically motivated.

"Chief Harrington is a loyal and devoted family man who has an unblemished record and has spent the last three decades working tirelessly to keep New York City safe," Weinstein said. "One would be hard-pressed to find a straighter arrow in their quiver."

Among the alleged favors was $59,000 spent on a private jet in February 2013 that took Reichberg, an unidentified detective and James Grant, commander of an Upper East Side precinct, to Las Vegas for Super Bowl weekend, the court papers said. The complaint said Reichberg and the friend arranged for a prostitute to join the flight and spend the weekend with the group, staying in Grant's luxury hotel room.

According to the FBI complaint, the prostitute told law enforcement agents that Grant and others "took advantage of her services" during the trip. [...]

Meir Pogrow: Both Pogrow and the alleged victims are unhappy with the way the case was handled

Just a brief comment regarding the role of Tamara Schoor presented in the article below. According to what I have been able to find out - while she was in fact very helpful in the testimony she gave - but she was not the reason that the beis din investigated the matter and it would have issued the same psak if she had not given testimony. There were in fact a number of brave young women who came forward - including Tamara Schoor - who provided the necessary testimony.

While it seems easy to slam the beis din for taking so long - no one has in fact stated the background information as to why this beis din was convened when it was  - and why nothing was done earlier. There is just a bunch of conjecture from various bloggers and advocates - which tries to paint the rabbis in as negative light as possible. Perhaps the young women who testified would be willing to write a guest post describing what actually happened. I am willing to publish it anonymously.

In addition if Meir Pogrow - or a supporter - would like to present his point of view with clear facts and evidence - I am open to the idea. I am not interested in a post saying "But he is so wonderful the accusations can't be true!"

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Jerusalem Post   Pogrow is the founder of a website and study program called Master Torah, designed to aide the study of religious texts and retain the knowledge acquired. According to the Master Torah website, Pogrow has rabbinical ordination from several authorities, including from the Chief Rabbinate and is qualified as a rabbinical judge.

He has taught at Yeshiva University High Schools of Los Angeles, the Michlahlah seminary in Jerusalem, and was head of the Kollel (program for married yeshiva students) of Aish HaTorah in Jerusalem and Austin, Texas. [...]

When Schoor came to Israel to study at Michlalah at the age of 18, she made contact with Pogrow again and would often meet with him at his home in Beit Shemesh, where she was also a frequent guest for Shabbat.

Schoor said she became dependent on the rabbi for spiritual guidance and that he was her only support system in Israel. She alleged that Pogrow used his mentoring relationship to initiate physical contact with her, telling her that it was part of the process for her spiritual growth and development.

Following the publication of the rabbinical court ruling, Schoor welcomed the decision but said that the ruling had been “a long-time coming” and that the rabbinical court “should have addressed this a long time ago but better late than never.” Schoor says she first brought the case to the attention of the rabbis on the rabbinical court five years ago.

Said Schoor in a statement to the press “I met Pogrow at the age of 15 when the process of grooming and manipulation began. [...]

“It was only when I became aware of the existence of other victims that I was determined to take action and prevent additional abuse. I began a campaign of phone calls and emails, reaching out to anyone I could identify in the hopes of finding additional victims to speak out with and a safe and reliable method of publicizing it anonymously. But at every turn a door closed, victims afraid to be exposed, rabbis finding excuses not to address it, organizations lying to protect themselves and much more.”

When contacted by The Jerusalem Post, Pogrow said he would not comment on the allegations themselves.

He said however that “I was never presented with any specific allegations when I visited the rabbinical court,” and added that he was never contacted by the rabbinical court after his one and only meeting with the rabbis concerned.

Schoor has provided a statement to the Israel Police and is looking into other options “to obtain some semblance of justice, and to protect girls and women.”

In the ruling issued by the ad hoc rabbinical court on June 14, rabbis Menachem Mendel Hacohen Shafran, Gershon Bass and Haim Malinowitz said that several rabbis and community figures had reported to them about Pogrow’s “deviant” behavior.

Having spoken with Pogrow, the rabbis issued a ruling prohibiting him from associating with women in any way and for any reason, including married and unmarried women of any age.

The rabbis also warned all women against meeting with Pogrow for any reason publicly or privately, and from contacting him in any way including my phone or by email and any other form of electronic correspondence.

The rabbis added that a woman in the US has helped Pogrow establish meetings with other women and said therefore that all women should avoid all contact with this individual as well.

Rabbis Bass and Malinowitz, along with rabbis Yitzhak Berkowitz, Mordechai Willig, and Elimelech Kornfeld, issued a separate document entitled “Warning to the Public.”

Wrote the rabbis “After the ruling was issued by the rabbinical court which determined with absolute certainty and established by reliable and credible witnesses and other proofs [all conducted in a manner which leaves no room for doubt], regarding the most terrible acts and the most severe transgressions regarding issues of forbidden sexual relationships, Heaven protect us, by Meir Pogrow (of Beit Shemesh - and America) and hearing about the damages he inflicted on women (including single, married Jewish and otherwise) who were under his influence (many of whose lives he destroyed)… it is our obligation to notify and warn women and girls in the strongest and most urgent terms, to distance themselves from any interaction from this individual, from his lectures, and from any area of his influence in any way.”

The Kol V’Oz organization for tackling sexual abuse in the Jewish community said that “Rabbi Meir Pogrow, a prominent rabbi, formerly of the US and currently Israel-based, has effectively been found guilty by the Beth Din of misusing his authority for his sexual gratification.”

Schoor herself issued concerns she had with the process of the rabbinical court in dealing with such issues, including that the system is reliant on the victim to bring additional victims forward as a part of the investigative process; that the process leaves the victim entirely at the mercy of the rabbinical court; and that the victim has to deal with rabbis and other officials who have no training in this field.

Manny Waks, director of Kol V’Oz, welcomed the ruling of the rabbinical court, but said that the process must be reformed.

“While it’s pleasing that the Beth Din in Israel has issued this strong and public ruling, the process must be examined so that other victims don’t endure what Ms Schoor has endured. It’s important to emphasize that if not for the courage and determination of Ms Schoor, this ruling would never have occurred. Ms Schoor has achieved a remarkable victory despite her difficult journey.”

This was 30 minutes of hell for this young lady': Unaccompanied minor groped on flight

Washington Post

The first warning sign came before the plane had even taken off.

Chad Cameron Camp had his choice of seats on the half-empty American Airlines flight from Dallas to Portland, Ore. But Camp, 26, curiously chose a middle seat — right next to an unaccompanied 13-year-old girl, the FBI said in a statement.

Flight attendants offered to move Camp to another seat where he would have more room, but he declined.

“No, I’m fine,” he said, according to a criminal complaint obtained by The Washington Post..

When a flight attendant returned for drink service a half hour later, she saw Camp’s hand on the teenager’s crotch, according to the complaint.

She also saw “a single tear coming down the victim’s cheek.”

Flight attendants separated Camp and the teenager for the rest of the voyage. And as soon as the plane landed, the unaccompanied minor was rushed off the plane.[...]

Camp then allegedly began brushing up against her upper arm and shoulder while ostensibly turning the pages of a magazine.

“Each time he turned the page he used his elbow to brush up against the victim’s shoulder and upper arm area. The victim attempted to move away from Camp’s physical contact, and each time she withdrew, he would laugh,” the complaint states. “After finishing with the magazine, Camp leaned toward the victim to place the magazine in the seat pocket in front of the victim. Camp instead dropped the magazine on the victim’s shoes.”

Later, while pretending to look out the window, Camp leaned across the girl again, putting his face just inches from hers, the complaint continues.

When the girl declined Camp’s offer to share his headphones, he allegedly threw them in her lap.

Camp then repeatedly placed his hand on the girl’s knee and upper thigh, according to the complaint.

“She had to push his hand off of her and cross her legs,” Goodfellow told The Post.

“What are you doing?” she asked him. But Camp just laughed and did it again, according to the complaint.

“She was frightened and trapped,” the complaint says.

“She was touched over 15 times,” Goodfellow said.

The incident only stopped when a female flight attendant came by to serve drinks and spotted Camp’s hand on the girl’s crotch, according to the complaint.

That’s also when the flight attendant noticed that the girl was crying. [...]

Meir Pogrow: An former yeshiva acquaintance describes the pain of his betrayal

I am quite sad as I pen my words here for the first time.I have always followed from afar, this blog as far back as the shocking story of Rabbi Tropper's sad downfall.I was so sure that after that unfortunate incident,that all the Rabbis that want to push Yiddishkeit would make sure they were 100% accountable to the public.

But sadly enough,there has been yet more and more sad stories of people we want to trust and yet are found out to be not who they are supposed to be.

This particular story crushed me as I knew him from the yeshiva we learnt together.I did not really have too much to do with him,but I was quite aware that he was considered to be one of the smartest guys around.I heard of his success,and was quite glad of it until I came across this sad article on Sunday declaring Meir to be a Rasha.Oh,oh,oh,I said to myself as my day was ruined.I feel so hurt for the yeshiva we learnt with,for the honor of the Torah,and for most of all,the hurt he did on all these people.I was so hoping that this story was not true.But oh to my dismay,to see the Rabbis sign against him.

Oh!!!And I can only scream out to Meir,why if you have these problems with women,did you have to carry on with the attitude of that I can still be a leader for Klal Yisrael??!!!Why do people like Tropper,Freundel,and Pogrow and all others brazenly think that if they are not around,Torah will not be taught??Torah will not be forgotten.But if you guys have issues,go find some other job and seek help through the therapist. Did these people really think that Hashem would let these people make a mockery out of his Torah???Meir was brilliant in making this program that helped people learn,but if he had this undeniable problem with women,why could he have not delegated his great idea to some kosher Yid???It would have been better for him to be some business man or even a garbageman,but not to do things to hurt people in the name of his misguided Torah.

Did Meir not know all the places in the Gemara that discusses Chillul Hashem??How about all the Levi from Bnei Kehat that would lose their lives if they came too close to the Aron Hakodesh in an improper fashion???This shows us how the Torah will not let it be maintained by someone that is not fit to be there.

If somebody wants to be a leader for Klal Yisrael,he cannot have this type of double life,and I can only pray and hope that once and for all that any Yid seeking to help us will examine himself carefully, have a competent Rav,and will know how to conduct himself properly in all situations.

How in this day and age,women will go to Rabbis without their husbands or at least it should be done openly is beyond me.Where do ladies think that Rabbis are angels??And if a Rabbi is meeting a lady in a not Jewish way or is talking in a not modest way,speak up immediately!!!Why was there such silence for so long!!!

Sorry for the longevity of the post,but this issue has broken my heart,since I knew Meir from way back,and I just wish I will never have to hear of this breach of faith again.We,Jews,have too many problems,and this problem should never be here to begin with.

Kiddush HaShem requires that we also deal properly with the evil that Jews sometimes do

Somone just sent me the following guest post. It clearly expresses that being a proper servant of HaShem requires understanding the collective nature of the Jewish people and the need to uproot evil from our midst. Just as we clearly celebrate the good we do as Jews - we need to condemn and criticize the bad. Failure to be concerned with publicizing the negative because of fears of chilul HaShem or degrading talmidei chachomim - results in the disaster described in the post.

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In שמואל בּ פּרק כ״א, it describes a famine in Dovid HaMelech time. After 3 years he consulted the אורים ותומים and was advised that the famine was a punishment for Shaul HaMelech (deceased) killing Givonim many years earlier. So Dovid HaMelech approached the king of the Givonim and asked how he can appease them, and the response was "we want to kill 7 of Shaul's descendants as retribution". So 7 family members were handed over, they were killed and hung on a tree for 7 months, and subsequently the famine ended.

Two questions arise: 1) why was the whole בּני ישׂראל punished for one persons crime and had to endure a famine? and 2) Shaul HaMelech was long deceased so why rehash old stories and bring to the worlds attention problems the Jews had in the past and punish them creating a חילול השׁם?

Answers: The Abarbanel (and it appears also the Malbim) comment that the reason the Jews were collectively punished was because they didn't protest Shaul HaMelech's actions of killing the Givonim. Regardless that he was the Melech, Godol, Daas Torah (all the above combined in one) you do not blindly listen especially if they're making a mistake. And to the contrary, you have a responsibility to protest these actions.

The second question is answered by the Gemora Yevamos (78B and 79A) (Rashi ד״ה ואל יתחלל שׁם שׁמים), that a חילול השׁם was caused among the non-Jews as they saw Jews can commit crimes and escape unpunished. But after killing the 7 descendants as retribution and hanging them on a tree for 7 months, people asked who they were and were told that they are of royalty and how Jews treat crime seriously regardless of the perpetrator's background. This created a massive קידושׁ השׁם and 150,000 people converted to Yiddishkeit in that period.

We learn from here that whether covering up child abuse crimes or any other crimes or assisting perpetrators to evade justice, this is a חילול השׁם. The חילול השׁם isn't the public court case where the culprit is on trial for their crimes, but rather Jews assisting criminals in evading justice. And to the contrary, the קידושׁ השׁם is when the world observes Jews treating crime seriously using the justice system appropriately.

Brandon Vandenberg (Former Vanderbilt football player) again convicted of rape

CBS News   A Nashville jury has found a former Vanderbilt football player guilty on all charges for his role in the rape of an unconscious woman he'd been dating.

It took the jury just over four hours to find 23-year-old Brandon Vandenburgguilty of five counts of aggravated rape, two counts of aggravated sexual battery and one count of unlawful photography.

CBS affiliate WTVF reported the verdict was reached nearly three years to the day of the assault, which rocked one of the nation's most prestigious universities.

The guilty verdict came after six days of grueling, graphic and emotional testimony -- most centering around the early morning hours of June 23, 2013, the day an unconscious female student from the dance team was sexually assaulted by several football players inside of a dorm room on the Vanderbilt campus.

Jurors had to decide whether to find Vandenburg guilty for things other men were accused of doing to the female student. His defense maintained he was drunk and should not be held responsible for what the others did. But prosecutors argued that he encouraged the rape and was part of it.

"Within two minutes of getting in that room, Mr. Vandenburg is directing someone what to do with a bottle that is in the victim," Assistant District Attorney Jan Norman said during closing arguments on Saturday morning.

"He brought her there, he served her up to three strangers; for whatever reason, it doesn't matter, it's that he did it," Norman added.

Before ending her closing arguments, Norman played the 49 second video clip Vandenburg shot on his iPhone, showing the victim being raped.

"Mr. Vandenburg got enjoyment out of it while it was happening, that enjoyment he got at that moment that is him benefiting from his actions," she added.

Yoel Oberlander (Convicted Sex Offender) Allegedly Abuses Sleeping Woman on El Al Flight From Tel Aviv to Newark

Haaretz   Yoel Oberlander, 35, was convicted of assaulting an 11-year-old girl in 2002. On the overnight flight, he is accused of repeatedly touching the woman sitting next to him without her consent.

According to the indictment, Yoel Oberlander, a 35-year-old from Monsey who was convicted in 2002 of sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl, was seating at the window seat next to the woman and her mother. Oberlander allegedly started touching the woman after dinner was served and the lights were dimmed. He allegedly placed his hands over the woman's thigh, and took it away after she moved. [...]

Oberlander was charged by federal prosecutors with abusive sexual contact on an airplane in a New Jersey court.  He faces up to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted. [...]

23 things Donald Trump has said that would have doomed another candidate

Washington Post

Donald Trump has, as of Thursday, been running for president for a year. It's been ... quite a year. Literally within the first five minutes of his speech announcing his candidacy, Trump declared that illegal immigrants from Mexico were rapists and drug dealers — the sort of comment that, for another candidate, would probably be disqualifying and ended his or her campaign before it really began.

For Trump, it wasn't. In fact, one could argue that the comment made his campaign — or at least set the tone for it; the ensuing fight with Univision sparked the flood of media attention that allowed Trump to crowd his 16 opponents off the airwaves.

Over the next 365 days, Trump said so many things that would have stumbled or destroyed other candidates that we tend to forget them. Remember when he got in a fight with the pope? Trump got in a fight with the pope. Then he went on to win the Republican nomination.

We did our best to collect every comment offered by Trump that, for a normal candidate, might well have been deadly. In doing so, we developed a "how deadly this would be to normal candidates" scale, expressed in a measure we call a "Jeb." How many normal, milquetoast Republican candidates out of 10 would have been doomed by that thing Trump said? A 1-Jeb comment may have taken out an already-weak candidate, but would probably be survivable by most. A 10-Jebber? Impossible to survive — for a mere mortal.[...]

So, buckle up. Marvel at the things Trump has gotten away with that another candidate would have had to spend weeks rebutting. If you're a candidate reading this at home: We cannot recommend the "say any old thing as frequently as possible" strategy for everyone.

1. Calls Mexican immigrants rapists

2. Says John McCain isn't a hero

3. Refers to Megyn Kelly's menstruation

4. Insults Carly Fiorina's looks

5. Says voters don't care about policy issues

6. Gets his military advice from news shows

7. Suggests 9/11 was George W. Bush's fault

8. Calls Iowa voters stupid

9. Says Muslims in New Jersey celebrated 9/11

10. Mocks a disabled reporter

11. Says Muslim migration should be banned

12. Doesn't know about the nuclear triad

13. Encourages rally violence, part I

14. Repeats a vulgar insult of Ted Cruz

15. Calls the pope "disgraceful"

16. Encourages rally violence, part II

17. Threatens to unwind the First Amendment

18. Declines to disavow racists

19. Refers to a certain part of his anatomy

20. Dismisses his campaign manager's grabbing a reporter

21. Blames the Internet for an unfounded allegation he made

22. Declares that women who have illegal abortions should be punished

23. Accuses a judge of being motivated by race

[Click above link for full article]

Florida Deputy Facing Child Sex Charges Fatally Shoots Self

ABC News   Florida sheriff's officials say a deputy facing 29 child sex-related charges has died after shooting himself.

Broward County Sheriff's spokeswoman Veda Coleman-Wright said in a news release that 43-year-old Sgt. Kreg Costa died Wednesday night at a hospital in Fort Lauderdale. She says Costa shot himself at his home in Sunrise after being released from jail on bond earlier Wednesday.

Investigators say staff at Costa's office noticed he was staying in his office during the night. A check into his computer showed he was viewing websites dedicated to hardcore pornography, incest and bondage while at work.

Authorities also say he exchanged sexually explicit emails and videos with a 16-year-old girl. [...]

Since all military roles including combat are open to women - they should be drafted like men

NY Times   In the latest and perhaps decisive battle over the role of women in the military, Congress is embroiled in an increasingly intense debate over whether they should have to register for the draft when they turn 18.

On Tuesday, the Senate approved an expansive military policy bill that would for the first time require young women to register for the draft. The shift, while fiercely opposed by some conservative lawmakers and interest groups, had surprisingly broad support among Republican leaders and women in both parties.

The United States has not used the draft since 1973 during the Vietnam War. But the impact of such a shift, reflecting the evolving role of women in the armed services, would likely be profound.

Under the Senate bill passed on Tuesday, women turning 18 on or after Jan. 1, 2018, would be forced to register for Selective Service, as men must do now. Failure to register could result in the loss of various forms of federal aid, including Pell grants, a penalty that men already face. Because the policy would not apply to women who turned 18 before 2018, it would not affect current aid arrangements.

“The fact is,” said Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, “every single leader in this country, both men and women, members of the military leadership, believe that it’s fair since we opened up all aspects of the military to women that they would also be registering for Selective Services.”

The Supreme Court ruled in 1981 that women did not have to register for the draft, noting that they should not face the same requirements as men because they did not participate on the front lines of combat. But since Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter said in December that the Pentagon would open all combat jobs to women, military officials have told Congress that women should also sign up for the draft.

“It’s my personal view,” Gen. Robert B. Neller, the commandant of the Marine Corps, told the Senate Armed Services Committee in February, that with the complete lifting of the ban on women in combat roles, “every American who’s physically qualified should register for the draft.”[...]

The debate will now pit the Senate against the House, where the policy change has support but was not included in that chamber’s version of the bill. [...]

Military experts say that even if the efforts to compel women to enlist fails in Congress, the issue is not going away.

“I think the change is inevitable,” said Nora Bensahel, a military policy analyst at American University’s School of International Service, “whether in this debate or through the courts. It just seems that now that you have women allowed to serve in any position in the military, there is no logical basis to say women should not be drafted.”

Conservative groups, which threatened to target senators who voted for the policy bill, reacted with anger on Tuesday to the bill’s passage. “Allowing our daughters to be forced into combat if there is a draft is a clear example of Washington placing more value on liberal social engineering than military objectives and preparedness,” one such group, Heritage Action for America, said in a news release.

The Senate is expected to hold its ground as conservative members defend the status quo. Mr. McCain, whose family has a long and storied history in the military and whose daughter-in-law is a captain in the Air Force Reserve, said to Mr. Cruz on the Senate floor: “I respect the senator from Texas’s view. Too bad that view is not shared by our military leadership, the ones who have had the experience in combat with women.”

Do child molesters have a high recidivism rate? Yes and No

Australian Institute of Criminology - Australian Government Publication

Two contrasting arguments have been made about child sex offenders’ proclivity to reoffend. In public and media discourse, child sex offenders are often constructed as compulsive recidivists who are virtually certain to reoffend. For example, in a second reading speech to the Legislative Council of South Australia about the Criminal Law (Sentencing) (Mandatory Imprisonment of Child Sex Offenders) Amendment Bill, one Parliamentarian described child sex offenders as ‘beings of a subhuman category...[they are]...the least rehabilitatable people’ (Bressington 2010).

Conversely, in the criminological literature, the opposite is often posited—that child sex offenders have low rates of recidivism compared with other types of offenders (see eg McSherry & Keyzer 2009; Minnesota Department of Corrections 2007).

It is certainly the case that many studies of child sex offenders have found low levels of recidivism (Doren 1998). Measuring sexual recidivism is, however, a challenging task (see Falshaw, Friendship &Bates 2003 for a discussion) and it is important to be aware of the limitations of these studies. There are a number of key decisions that researchers make when measuring the recidivism of child sex offenders that can impact the findings of studies. Two key decisions are the definition of recidivism and the period of time over which recidivism is measured.

In most studies of general reoffending, recidivism is defined as a reconviction for a new offence. As sexual offences are often not reported (Abel et al. 1987; Bates, Saunders & Wilson 2007) and sexual offending against children has one of the highest rates of attrition of any offence (ie a relatively small proportion of cases progresses successfully through the criminal justice system; Eastwood, Kift & Grace 2006), studies of child sex offender recidivism that rely on reconvictions as a measure of recidivism provide only ‘a diluted measure of true reoffense rates’ (Doren 1998: 99).

As a result, some studies of child sex offender recidivism have defined recidivism as an arrest or charge (rather than a conviction) for a new sexual offence. This approach is also limited, but is likely to provide a more accurate measure of recidivism than reconvictions. As Doren (1998: 101) argues

although some portion of the people charged with a new sexual crime may [have] been both innocent of that charge and of any other recidivating sexually predatory acts, this portion would likely be far smaller than the number of re-offenders who are never caught and charged.

For a variety of reasons, recidivism studies usually follow up offenders over a short period, such as two or three years. While this is often necessary due to time and budget constraints, the longer a period over which recidivism in measured, the higher the rate of recidivism is likely to be (Tresidder, Homel & Payne 2009). While child sex offender studies often show low levels of recidivism, Salter (2003) argues that these studies obscure the reality that in the long term, rates of recidivism can be much higher (see also Bates, Saunders & Wilson 2007).

Studies that narrowly define recidivism and use short follow-up periods may therefore underestimate the rate of recidivism of child sex offenders (Moulden et al. 2009). Prentky et al.’s (cited in Doren 1998) study of recidivism rates among extrafamilial child sex offenders over a 25 year period used a new charge for a sex offence as the measure of recidivism. This study found that 52 percent of child sex offenders reoffended during the 25 year at-risk period. As Doren (1998: 101) argues, however, due to the limitations of recidivism studies on child sex offenders described above

 the 52% recidivist figure should be considered as a conservative approximation of the true base rate for sex offense recidivism in previously convicted child molesters...[it]...represents the lowest approximation for extrafamilial child molester sexual recidivism.

As described above, the category of ‘child sex offender’ includes diverse offenders with diverse motivations, including those who meet the diagnostic criteria for paedophilia. It is important to recognise that within the broad offender category of child sex offenders, some subcategories of offenders are likely to be at greater risk of reoffending than others. As Petrunik and Deutschmann (2008: 500) argue:

some sex offenders—notably, extrafamilial offenders with male victims who meet clinical criteria for paraphilias, such as paedophilia or exhibitionism—do offend with high frequency over long periods.

Research by Prentky et al. (cited in Doren 1998) described above, measured the recidivism of extrafamilial child sex offenders. As discussed in more detail below, research shows that extrafamilial child sex offenders perpetrate offences against many more victims than intrafamilial offenders and should therefore not be considered representative of all child sex offenders.

The empirical literature therefore suggests that both the media’s insistence that child sex offenders are compulsive recidivists and criminologists’ counterargument that child sex offenders are unlikely to reoffend may be somewhat skewed. While better quality evidence is required on the question of child sex offender recidivism, the existing research literature indicates that some subgroups of child sex offenders have higher rates of recidivism than others. For example, those who offend against children in their own families have access to only a small number of children, thereby limiting opportunities for recidivism to occur. The competing claims outlined at the opening of this section—ie that all child sex offenders will reoffend/that there is a low recidivism rate among child sex offenders—may not be as mutually exclusive as they appear. The research literature indicates that among a subset of child sex offenders—those who target male victims outside of their family—reoffending in the long term is likely and far more likely than for child sex offenders who target female and/or family member victims.

Ignoring danger signs can be fatal: Alligator snatches toddler in front of parents at Disney resort

USA Today    A desperate search is underway for a 2-year-old boy who was snatched by an alligator while wading in a lake at a Disney World resort hotel Tuesday night, law enforcement officials said. [...]

The boy was playing in about a foot of water in a beach area with his father when he was taken by an alligator that witnesses described as anywhere from four to seven feet in length.

"The father entered the water and he tried to grab the child, but was not successful in doing so," Demings said. The mother rushed into the water to try and help the father wrestle the boy from the alligator. When the frantic couple was unable to pull their son to safety, they cried for help and a nearby lifeguard called 911.[...]

There are posted signs warning guests against swimming in the lake, according to Demings.

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A similar disregard for posted danger signs happened with a group of frum kids supervised by 2 adults walking along a stretch of dangerous beach in England. They passed and ignored 9 warning signs and consequently endangered their lives from an incoming tide that would have washed them out to sea.

The Guardian  More than 30 teenagers trapped by the rising tide on a treacherous rocky shore when a coastal walk went dangerously wrong were rescued by helicopter and lifeboats after using their mobile phone torches as distress beacons.

The 34 boys, aged between 13 and 14 and accompanied by two adults, got stranded after descending from the coastal path between St Margaret’s Bay and Dover harbour during the trip organised by the Ahvas Yisroel community centre in Stamford Hill, north London, on Monday.[...]

The coastguard launched an air and sea search involving a helicopter based at Lydd, Dover RNLI lifeboat, two inshore Walmer RNLI lifeboats and Langdon coastguard team.

A team of volunteers from the Stamford Hill Shomrim volunteer guard, the Jewish neighbourhood watch organisation, also rushed to Dover to assist with the search after one of those stranded alerted it to the group’s plight at about 9pm.

All were finally rescued by 11pm from three locations, as the group had split up, and were strung out along one mile of coastline. Thirty-one were rescued by lifeboat, while five, who were on nearby rocks shouting for help, were taken by helicopter. None required hospital treatment. [...]

Mark Finnis, Dover RNLI coxswain, said the group had been in great danger. “From what I can make out, they walked along the top of the cliff to St Margaret’s Bay from Dover. Once they got to St Margaret’s Bay, I’m understanding, they thought they would take a short cut back long the rocky shoreline.

“It is very inhospitable. We are not talking about little rocks, There are some pretty hefty boulders down there. They weren’t dressed for it at all, didn’t have the correct footwear,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“Less than two hours later, they would have been swimming, because the tide is rising all the time. They were cut off by the tide. There is no footpath in this particular stretch of shoreline. It is purely a rocky walk.” [...]

He said the group were in high spirits and had not seemed to appreciate the danger they were in, which was spelled out to them when they got back to Dover. The RNLI said the group had walked past nine signs warning them not to continue. 

A spokesman for the community centre said a full investigation into the incident would be held so that lessons could be learned, and praised the coastguard and RNLI. The boys were being supervised by two community centre staff at the time. [...]

Andy Roberts, Launching Authority at Dover lifeboat station, said “everything was thrown” at this rescue. “If we hadn’t got there in time, it could have been a different story. It could have been a tragedy. It is a 300ft cliff, and the signal can be bad.

“If the phones hadn’t worked, we wouldn’t have known they were there. There are no passing ships, or people on the clifftop, not at that time of night. The majority of them didn’t realise the implications of what could have happened.”

He added: “The group were spread out over a mile. They should have stayed together. It is a lot easier searching for 36 people grouped together than separated.” [...]