Peeping Rabbi Lawsuit Seeks More Than $100M for Victims

WASHINGTON, DC — A class action lawsuit against the rabbi who recorded women inside a sacred bath seeks more than $100 million in damages for the dozens of victims.

Rabbi Barry Freundel led Kesher Israel synagogue in Georgetown and taught at Georgetown and Towson universities. Inside the National Capital Mikvah, he hid cameras that recorded women in the mikvah, or sacred bath.

While he was convicted of 52 counts of voyeurism, prosecutors allege there were at least 150 victims, including former students. The law firm representing the victims is now seeking more than $100 million from the religious organizations that employed Freundel, claiming they did not intervene despite warning signs.

"The complaint accuses Orthodox religious institutions of sitting idly by as Rabbi Freundel committed his crimes," said Ira Sherman, managing partner with Chaikin, Sherman, Cammarata & Siegel, which is representing the victims. "Rather than preventing or investigating Rabbi Freundel's crimes early on, these religious institutions repeatedly endorsed Rabbi Freundel as a religious leader whom vulnerable women were required to defer to and obey."

In addition to Freundel, the complaint names these institutions as defendants:

• National Capital Mikvah — Jewish ritual bath where Freundel recorded his victims; the organization is accused of endorsing the rabbi's ruse of so-called "practice dunks," something not found in Orthodox Judaism as part of conversion that he used as an excuse to record women students in the nude.
• Kesher Israel — Georgetown synagogue that employed Freundel for 25 years, where personnel allegedly knew of and discouraged reports about his inappropriate behavior with female congregants.
• Rabbinical Council of America — organization that gave Freundel power to direct Orthodox practices nationwide regarding religious conversion; the council and Beth Din allegedly knew of inappropriate comments to women and suspected extramarital affairs yet did not investigate them.
• Beth Din of America — religious court that authorized Freundel to oversee Orthodox conversions; the lawsuit alleges that the court did not correct Freundel's practice of encouraging women to take "practice dunks" in the bath, which is not Jewish tradition, and did not investigate allegations of misconduct.

The goal of the class action suit is to "send a strong message that even institutions draped in the cloak of spirituality won't escape punishment when they violate their legal obligations," said David Sanford, chairman of Sanford Heisle and lead counsel in the class action suit.

"Defendants flagrantly broke their promises, egregiously breached their duties to the women who used the mikvah, and let Rabbi Freundel's crimes go unchecked for years," Sanford said in a statement. "We will ask a D.C. jury to hold all defendants liable and impose punitive damages..."

A separate class action suit has been filed against Georgetown University, which allegedly "turned a blind eye to obvious signs of Freundel's increasingly bizarre and obviously improper behavior," court documents state. Towson students have joined that suit, Patch previously reported.

Currently, Freundel is serving more than six years in jail for recording women undressing at the National Mikvah from 2012 to 2014. He pleaded guilty to 52 counts of voyeurism.

At sentencing in May, the judge called Fruendel’s actions “a classic abuse of power and violation of trust."

According to court documents, Freundel advocated for the construction of a mikvah near his temple and became its overseer when it opened in 2005.

See Also:

• Peeping Rabbi, Former Towson Prof Sentenced to 6.5 Years
• Former Towson Professor Challenges Voyeurism Sentence
• Georgetown Rabbi Resigns from Towson University Post
• Rabbi Pleads Guilty to 52 Counts of Voyeurism
• Towson Students Join Lawsuit Against Georgetown Rabbi
• Rabbi May Have Secretly Recorded More Than 150 Women
• Authorities Set Up Hotline for Potential Victims of Rabbi