ADL appeals to attorney general in Rubashkin case

By Ben Harris · December 24, 2008

NEW YORK (JTA) -- The Anti-Defamation League has asked the U.S. attorney general to ensure that Israel's Law of Return is not used to deny bail to Jewish defendants.

In a letter Wednesday to Michael Mukasey, an Orthodox Jew, ADL National Director Abraham Foxman took note of a federal magistrate judge's recent denial of bail to the former manager of the Agriprocessors kosher meatpacking plant.

The judge, Jon Scoles, ruled that Rubashkin posed a risk of flight and declined to release him on bail, pointing to evidence that he had a travel bag with cash and travel documents on hand at the time of his arrest. He also noted that two others accused of crimes connected to their work at Agriprocessors are believed to have fled to Israel.

Scoles took note of Israel's Law of Return, which grants automatic citizenship to Jews.

On Monday, the judge denied a request to reconsider the judgment. Rubashkin's attorneys are said to be considering an appeal.

“The most troubling aspect here is that the government does not appear to have alleged, nor does the Detention Order conclude, that Defendant Rubashkin has any particular ties to Israel (he is alleged to have visited Israel in December 2007),” Foxman wrote. “Instead, the government and the Detention Order appear to conclude that simply because Defendant Rubashkin is Jewish, and because Jews may have a claim on Israeli citizenship, his religion is relevant to a bail hearing.”

In their request for consideration, Rubashkin's attorneys argued at length that invoking the Law of Return was illegitimate, noting that under the government's reasoning, every American Jew would be viewed as a heightened flight risk, including Mukasey himself and two justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. They further proposed several additional measures to ensure Rubashkin did not flee, including 24-hour security surveillance at the defendant's expense.

In denying the motion, Scoles asserted that Rubashkin's attorneys “attach too much significance” to the Law of Return factor in the original decision and that they had not produced any new information bearing on his risk of flight.

Rubashkin was arrested in late October on charges relating to the hiring of illegal workers at the company's Postville, Iowa, packing plant. While free on bond, he was arrested a second time and charged with bank fraud.

Discussions About this Article Elsewhere

Trackback URL: http://jta.org/trackback/1001808/

No trackbacks have been created for this article, be the first to create one.

Comments RSS Feed Reader Comments

Sue Mizrahi

12/25/08 01:05 AM

Guilty is not the issue -Abusing the Law of Return is the issue - Madoff sits in his penthouse and Rubashkin sits in jail -

Benjamin

12/25/08 08:19 PM

Great, maybe the ADL can stop defaming people like Rabbi Meir Kahane and stop supporting an independent Islamic terrorist state in the heart of Israel and the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Jews from portions of Israel. Yes, this is what they advocate when the ADL, along with 13 other organizations under the JCPA officially endorse a two-state “solution” - what any of that has to do with “defamation” is beyond me. Thanks, Abe. A little late to the party on the Rubashkin case, as the whole thing was a giant smear campaign conducted by secular leftist Jews, labor unions, and the democratic party. Rubashkin will be vindicated. The whole thing went down because of antisemitisim, yet the ADL missed the boat on that one. What exactly do they do with the $80 million a year other than pretend to make a positive difference? They push a secular liberal agenda, is all.

To comment on this article, you must first be registered with JTA.