Jewish-American pedophiles flee justice by coming to Israel

Many Jewish people have decided to use the right of return to build their lives in Israel – after all, the law is meant to offer anyone who is Jewish a legal way to come to Israel and become a part of the Jewish state. However, the law can also be used by Jewish-American pedophiles to escape justice for their crimes, CBS reported on Wednesday.

The CBS reporter joined Jewish Community Watch (JCW) activists as they were looking for Jimmy Karow, who fled the US in 2000 after being accused of sexually assaulting a nine-year-old girl in Oregon. Karow, who is wanted by Interpol, yet was able to remain in Israel, where he allegedly moved between different Jewish communities to avoid being exposed.

While staying in Israel, he was accused of sexually assaulting a young girl.

After an Israeli court found him guilty of child molestation in 2002, he served time in prison and was released.

According to JCW founder Meyer Seewald, the Jewish community is in the same spot as the Catholic Church, meaning that men and women who are accused of assaulting children are aided by a culture of silence that prefers to keep things under wraps.

Just as some Catholic clergymen took a stand against this culture of silence, so did Rabbi Yehuda Oppenheimer who told CBS he was an unwitting aid-provider to Karow.

Karow met Oppenheimer when he wanted to convert to Judaism, and then mentioned that he wanted to go to Israel.

"He said 'I plan to go to Israel, I need to go much more quickly than I thought I needed to go,'" Oppenheimer told CBS.

The rabbi believed him when he said that “something” happened in his past, but that nothing happened since.

“So I wrote him a letter,” Opppenheimer said, adding that he also put Karow in touch with people he could stay with as he began his life in Israel.

It was the daughter of these people that Karow sexually assaulted. When the rabbi learned of this, he said he felt like he was punched in the gut.

After his release, Karow continued to move between communities. However, an Israeli woman – who did not disclose her name in order to protect her family – is pressing charges against him for sexually assaulting her when she was five years old, CBS reported.

JCW activists spotted Karow and informed the police, who came and arrested him.

His accuser told CBS that she felt relieved.

Another alleged sex offender mentioned in the CBS report is Mordechai Yomtov, who plead guilty in 2002 to abusing three boys before fleeing to Israel.

JCW was able to track him down in Jerusalem, where he is living illegally, and spoke to him while recording him with a hidden camera.

Unlike Karow, Yomtov, asked forgiveness from his victims in the televised report.

“I'm very, very sorry,” he said, “I hope that God will help every single person who went through this. Please forgive me."

Yomtov did not admit to any wrongdoing in the case of Mendy Hauck, who was allegedly abused as an eight-year-old by him when he worked as a Hebrew teacher. The reported offenses took place in 1999.

Police arrested Yomtov in 2001 under for sexually assaulting three other students. He pled guilty and after served time in jail. But once free on probation in 2002, Yomtov fled the US via Mexico, where he was able to flee to Israel with a fake passport.

However, he remains at large to this day.

If CBS and JCW were able to track both men down, it is unclear why both US and Israeli law enforcement could not.