June 11, 2005

Missing Arizona rabbi faces child abuse charges

ARIZONA
Jerusalem Post

By SAM SER

Rabbi David E. Lipman has disappeared without a trace from his home and Reform synagogue in Prescott, Arizona, missing since May 20 after two teenage girls from his congregation accused him of fondling them.

Prescott police have no leads on the whereabouts of Lipman, who is reported to be proficient in several languages and who spent time in Israel during his studies at Hebrew Union College. Neither he nor his plum-colored 1999 Saturn station wagon has turned up, police said.

"We have contacted immigration, we have contacted this border patrol, we have contacted the FBI," public information officer Lt. Pete Hodap told The Jerusalem Post. "We have not located him, and we have no idea at this point where he is. We worry that he may be where you are," Hodap said, referring to Israel. "And [suicide] is always a possibility..."

It was Lipman's wife who reported him missing nearly three weeks ago. Days earlier he had been approached at Temple B'rith Shalom by police investigating a complaint from Child Protection Services regarding the older of the two girls.

"The abuse started with back massages, then Lipman would move his hands to her buttocks, breasts and (private parts)," according to a Prescott Police Department report. "She recalls the touching being under her clothes rather than over her clothes."

Posted by kshaw at June 11, 2005 12:47 PM