Another Shoe May Drop in Chabad of Poway Case

By Donald H. Harrison

SAN DIEGO – The Passover 2019 attack on Chabad of Poway in which congregant Lori Gilbert-Kaye was murdered and three other persons were wounded has prompted a pair of criminal cases and a civil case in its wake, while a fourth criminal case involving tax fraud proceeds in federal court.

Both the state and federal governments have criminal cases pending against the alleged shooter, John T. Earnest, who may face the death penalty in either of the two courts.

Former Chabad Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein, who was wounded in the attack, is a key figure in the two other cases.  In one he has already pleaded guilty to charges of federal tax fraud and is scheduled to be sentenced October 26.  The other case is a civil action filed in San Diego County Superior Court by the family of Noya Dahan, who was 8-years-old when she was also wounded in the attack.  Brought by Israel Dahan, her father, the suit contends the synagogue which Goldstein ran should have provide security on the day of the attack but didn’t.

Months before the attack, Chabad of Poway had been notified that its application for federal funds to install security systems had been approved.   Some of the funds were received at the beginning of March 2019, but no action was taken to protect congregants despite concerns for the security of Jewish institutions that had been heightened on Oct. 27, 2018  by the attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in which 11 people were murdered.

The Dahan suit contends that Chabad of Poway should have instituted security measures even in advance of receiving the funds, so that the Passover gunman would not have been able to simply walk unchallenged into the foyer of the Chabad and start shooting.

Besides Goldstein and Dahan, the other party who was wounded was Almog Peretz, the uncle of Noya.

Given the controversy over when funds should have been spent for security, the tangled finances of Chabad of Poway may become a factor in the civil suit, with Goldstein’s guilty plea in the fraud case a possible factor in the Dahan family civil suit.

Although numerous big money contributions supposedly were made to Chabad of Poway during Goldstein’s tenure, the rabbi had entered into secret agreements with large donors to refund 90 percent of their contributions, keeping only 10 percent for such uses as he deemed appropriate. Nevertheless Goldstein gave 18 donors receipts for the entire amounts, enabling them to claim huge tax deductions on their income tax forms, while Goldstein secretly retaining 90 percent–or $6.2 million– of the alleged contributions, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Describing Goldstein as a cooperating witness, the U.S. Attorney’s office, under Robert Brewer Jr., recommended probation for Goldstein, angering many in the Jewish community who believe that Goldstein had desecrated the office of rabbi for personal profit, and had brought the community into disrepute in the process.

Brewer, along with other U.S. attorneys who served as part of former President Donald Trump’s Justice Department, has since resigned, clearing the way for President Joe Biden to appoint a successor.  It is not yet known who will be the next U.S. Attorney in San Diego, nor whether that person will review the probation recommendation in Goldstein’s case.

The Dahans’ civil suit names as defendants not only Chabad of Poway, but also Chabad of California which oversees more than 200 Chabad organizations in the state.  In particular, the suit named Rabbi Simcha Backman as a defendant as he is the person in charge of securing and allocating federal funds among the various Chabad institutions.

Some six months before the Passover 2019 shooting, the federal government had confronted Rabbi Goldstein about the tax fraud scheme and persuaded him to cooperate as agents gathered evidence against the fraudulent donors.  Rather than force Goldstein’s immediate resignation by revealing the charges against him, the U.S. Attorney’s office allowed him to continue in his position as head of Chabad of Poway, so as not to prematurely alarm those donors targeted in the investigation.

So secret was Goldstein’s criminal involvement that he was invited to the White House after the shooting to appear at the National Prayer Breakfast with then-President Trump.  He even accepted an invitation an invitation from Israel’s Ambassador Danny Danon to speak about antisemitism to the United Nations General Assembly.

One cannot help but wonder whether the secretive U.S. Attorney’s office made a tragic mistake in this regard.  If the office had disclosed Goldstein’s tax fraud, forcing him to resign from office, would Chabad higher-ups have moved to replace him with a senior rabbi, who would have been more attentive to the congregation’s security needs?   While the investigation was ongoing, in a cover story approved by the U.S. Attorney’s office, Chabad of Poway announced that Rabbi Goldstein was recovering from the trauma of the attack and that his son, Rabbi Mendel Goldstein, temporarily would take his place.  After Goldstein pleaded guilty in federal court to the tax evasion, the son was permitted to stay as Chabad of Poway’s permanent leader.

When scandals have hit other congregations, some have adopted the philosophy that a “good broom sweeps clean.”  But with a member of Goldstein’s family still running the congregation, one has to wonder whether the entire story will ever come out.

Perhaps the Dahan family suit, during the process of legal discovery, will bring out more of the facts.

 

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Donald H. Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World.  He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com