Friday, April 25, 2008
20 Nissan 5768, Sixth day of Passover – The Festival of Freedom
The Honorable Charles J. Hynes,
Kings County District Attorney
350 Jay St. Brooklyn, New York, 11201
Over the last months, members of the JLC have repeatedly met in your office, concerned that the armed muggings and bigoted harassment against the Orthodox Jewish community continue unchecked. This is in sharp contrast to the attention to justice you’ve shown to the recent allegations against an Orthodox Jew by an African American.
Continued in the Extended Article.
Open Letter to Brooklyn DA Charles Hynes from the Jewish Leadership Council in Crown Heights
The political and media outrage following the alleged attack by Jewish boys in Crown Heights on Mr. Andrew Charles leaves the Jewish community shocked and anxious. We will not let a one-sided story be told. We will not curl-up in fear while our families are terrorized.
Friday, April 25, 2008
20 Nissan 5768, Sixth day of Passover – The Festival of Freedom
The Honorable Charles J. Hynes,
Kings County District Attorney
350 Jay St. Brooklyn, New York, 11201
Over the last months, members of the JLC have repeatedly met in your office, concerned that the armed muggings and bigoted harassment against the Orthodox Jewish community continue unchecked. This is in sharp contrast to the attention to justice you’ve shown to the recent allegations against an Orthodox Jew by an African American.
Continued in the Extended Article.
The past year has been a year of nightmares for our community: On July 8th, Mr. Moshe Kozlovsky was mercilessly beaten with pipes and bottles in the neighborhood. On August 22nd, Yechiel Rappaport was attacked by 4 members of the African American community resulting in the loss of 5 teeth. 16-year-old Mendel Chesney was attacked on Yom Kippur and beaten to within an inch of his life, putting him into a coma. A community blog documented 34 instances of assault by black teens on the men, women and children of Jewish Crown Heights—in one case, against a 73-year-old grandmother!
This week you announced a Grand Jury investigation into allegations against members of our community. If this is a new level of commitment towards prosecuting criminals, Jewish or black, we support your efforts 100%. If, however, your office has scurried to react because the alleged victim is the son of a police officer and the alleged assailant is an Orthodox Jew, we take issue with not having equal protection under the law.
As for the actual charge against boys in our community: The police department’s handling of the issue was outrageous if not illegal. Officers of the 71st Pct. used a fictitious hostage charge to break into the Ezagui family home at 2 AM. When 20-year-old Aaron Ezagui—not the alleged attacker—
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asked if the officers had a warrant, he was arrested on trumped-up OGA charges, put into solitary confinement, chained to a wall—effecting a sleep-deprivation tactic—and forced to urinate while standing in his cell like an animal!
This was a detestable miscarriage of justice and a blatant abuse of the democratic legal system. If you were looking for justice, the violation of Aaron Ezagui’s civil rights and the police misconduct would be under investigation.
As members of the Orthodox Jewish community, we do not condone violence and we do not support attacks like those alleged by Mr. Andrew Charles. We do however point to the violence against Orthodox Jews in which you have thus far refused to show the same level of commitment, and we firmly appeal to you to treat our plight with the same concern for justice.
After a decade or more of calm, our community once again lives in fear. The murder of Mr. Efraim Klein in 2006, one day before he was to celebrate his son’s wedding, remains unsolved. This week’s assault during the Passover holiday in Rochester Park on a member of the Orthodox Jewish community has not resulted in any arrests though the perpetrator was immediately identified.
It has been a tough struggle to have our fear brought to the attention of the highest-ranking officers in the NYPD and city government—but it has happened, and we will do all we can to ensure we are never again painted as the unprovoked aggressors in a long history of victimhood in which we sat idly by.
We will tell our story and we will see true and unbiased justice served.
In the name of the Jewish Leadership Council,
Barry Sugar
For questions about, and further details of these assaults and police misconduct in the 71st Precinct, please contact Barry Sugar at 917-680-2000
WERE IS BARRY
Is this what you have become berel ? a letter writer ??? where is the man who spoke out in support of our community ??? you were doing great, do so again. LET YOUR VOICE BE HEARD !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
MADDINSANECRAZY
THIS LETTER IS SO VERY SAD AND BEAUTIFULY WRITTEN, HOWEVER BEING SOMEONE WHO WAS TARGETED AND MASSERED TO THE POLICE WITH FALSE ACCUSATIONS BY THE VERY SAME SHIMIRA “CRIMINAL” ORGINAZATION, ITS VERY HARD TO FEEL SAD WHEN ITS ONLY G-D SHOWING HE STILL DOES EXIST, AS FOR BEREL SUGAR IT SEEMS HE REALLY WANTS TO DO GOOD FOR THE COMMUNITY, BUT HE SHOULD REALLY TAKE CARE WHEN GETTING INVOLVED WITH THE LIKES OF THE SHMIRA LEADERS, LESSON #1 WHEN JIONING THE ORGIZATION “YOU ARE PART OF A MOB ”ANYONE” WHO MESSES WITH JUST CALL FOR BACK UP AND WE WILL TAKE CARE OF HIM, TO THE COMMUNITY, THANK G-D SHOMRIM STANDS IN THE WAY OF SHIMIRA TAKING OVER THE NEIGHBORHOOD AND MAKING YOU PAY WHETHER YOU’D LIKE TO OR NOT.
disgusted
Great letter, articulate, sane…but it doesn’t go far enough. How about actually stating that there is 1 form of justice for Blacks & 1 for Jews, & we are obviously discriminated against! This is proven by the fact that no charges were brought against Black attackers of Jews, but in 1 “alleged” incident, there’s a rush to indict. And what is being done re the Ezagui incident? No statement of intent there.
Hynes is a coward. Where’s Hanna White, his “Jewish Liaison”? She’s supposed to work on our behalf, but as yet there’s been nothing from her. Maybe her soft job is more important than looking out for us?
Talk is easy. Action needs effort.
Yitzchak
Thank you barry
chaim
should we use this email address to voice our compaints?
charles.hynes@charlesjhynes.com
Jack tensil
Charles Hynes conducted a sham grand jury proceeding for the murder of Gideon Busch because he was not interested in prosecuting police officers and because he did not receive enough of a call for justice from the Jewish community. Charles Hynes administers justice on a selective basis depending upon whom the victim is. This man is corrupt to the very core of his being and should be fought tooth and nail to the end. He is not about administering justice but about catering to his own whimiscal notions about who should be prosecuted. All should remember how this man came to fame: by doing the bidding of Al Sharpton in the Howard Beach case. All Sharpton did after that was use Hynes “justice” to fabricate crimes such as Tawana Brawley and to incite other criminal acts such as the one that resulted in the death of Yankel Rosenbaum H’yd. Charles Hynes is no friend of the Jewish community and never was.