Letter on Washington Hebrew Congregation Child Sex Abuse Lawsuit

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01/19/2023 14:38

Subject: Letter on Washington Hebrew Congregation Child Sex Abuse Lawsuit

quote

Anonymous

I saw this on Facebook at this link and had to share. I am horrified. https://www.facebook.com/621501325/posts/10158723438851326/?flite=scwspnss

Also sharing the text here:

Dear WHC Community,

We are the mothers and fathers of children abused by a teacher at Washington Hebrew Congregation’s preschool. We are a diverse group. Some of us were, like many of you, long- time WHC congregants, celebrating our B’nai Mitzvot, weddings, and other life events at the Temple; some of us are Jewish but never belonged to the Temple; and others are not Jewish but share values of the Jewish community. All of us entrusted our children to the Temple’s care when we enrolled them at the preschool.

In April 2019, we filed a lawsuit on behalf of our children and ourselves to hold the Temple and the preschool Director accountable for enabling a child predator to abuse our children at the incredibly young ages of 2 to 4. The Temple and its leaders had a duty to care for our children, protect them, and ensure their safety. We believe the Temple failed. The evidence shows: our children behaved in ways that a properly trained and educated staff should have been able to identify as telltale signs of abuse; the predator teacher engaged in behavior that should have been identified as grooming; red flags went unnoticed or ignored; and when concerns about this teacher were raised with the preschool Director and Temple leadership, they were dismissed out of hand.

The Temple’s failings have caused our children unspeakable trauma. Some of our children have said that the predator teacher touched them improperly, in some instances penetrating their private parts with his fingers, and made them touch other toddlers improperly; disclosed that he exposed his genitals to them; implied, by using descriptions such as “vanilla pee,” that he ejaculated on or in front of them. Some of the children have woken in the middle of the night, screaming in terror; had suicidal ideations and engaged in self-harming behavior; been overly aggressive; or engaged in inappropriate, sexualized behaviors.

We hope and pray our children’s wounds will heal. But research shows that even if our children compartmentalize what happened to them at an age too young to understand, they are more likely as they get older to become addicted to drugs or alcohol as a refuge from their pain; to be triggered by their trauma when they engage in their first intimate experiences; to suffer from depression, anxiety, feelings of isolation and stigma, and poor self-esteem, potentially leading to suicide; to have difficulty trusting others; and to show a tendency toward revictimization.

We feel unspeakable guilt, fear, and sadness for what happened to our children, and for not having been able to prevent it. The best we can do now is tell our children that we did everything we could to hold the Temple and its leadership accountable. That is why we brought the lawsuit against the Temple and the preschool Director and why we are moving ahead toward a trial to vindicate our children’s rights in court in March 2023. No matter the outcome, we will tell our children we fought to seek some measure of justice and accountability.

While this is our first outreach to this community, the Temple has written to you many times over the past several years about the circumstances underlying our suit and a similar one brought by the D.C. Attorney General. Time and again, we believe they have tried to mislead you. It is misleading that the Temple’s preschool was in substantial compliance with D.C. regulations, as they told you in a February 27, 2019 report written by their retained lawyers that they released to preschool parents. It is misleading that our lawsuit is only about negligence, not the underlying allegation of sexual abuse, as they told you in their September 14, 2022 letter. It is misleading that the D.C. Attorney General sued over violations “administrative in nature,” as they claimed in their December 28, 2022 letter. The evidence shows that the predator teacher—who had been hired, without verifying his prior employment or educational history, as a teacher and an “informal photographer” who used his own camera—was alone with children on a regular basis, in some instances for over an hour at a time, unresponsive via walkie talkie, in the woods, in the bathroom, and behind closed doors in the construction room (a room with no windows). Our lawsuit alleges that the predator teacher was able to abuse small children on an ongoing basis for over two years.

The Temple had every opportunity to apologize and do right by our children and the others who were abused. But the Temple instead has chosen to try to discredit us and our children. Now, with trial set to start on March 13, 2023, the Temple seeks to turn over its limited insurance money to the court and be discharged from the case, so that the public will never hear the evidence of the harm caused to our children, whom we entrusted to the Temple’s care. After having taken so much from our families already, the Temple now seeks to take away our right to our day in court.

Aided by its retained lawyers and crisis managers, it appears that the Temple has gone to great lengths to avoid a public accounting of its actions. The Temple contends they did nothing wrong, yet they seem to have spent a great deal of time, energy, and money to make sure no one hears the truth in a court of law. Unlike the Temple, we are prepared to go to trial because it is the clearest path we see towards accountability and justice. We hope that you will see through the Temple’s attempts to deny, discredit, and mislead, and will instead choose to stand behind us and our children in solidarity.