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	What We Do By Andrew A. Buerger Baltimore Jewish Times June 4, 2009 http://www.jewishtimes.com/index.php/jewishtimes/article/what_we_do/ How many times have you been watching the TV news when they interview the person living next door to a recently arrested child molester or serial killer and they say, “Gee, he was such a good neighbor; he even helped me shovel my driveway when it snowed.” According to some sociologists, many molesters are kind, endearing people. In fact, that’s how they lure in their victims. So it shocked many here, but is no surprise to some experts, that last month Rabbi Jacob A. Max was found guilty of fourth-degree sexual molestation. Here’s a guy who, over the past six decades, has officiated at countless simchot in our community. He was there to officiate at a funeral when someone was in need; likewise at births, weddings, b’nai mitzvah and more. At the same time, according to one of his alleged victims, while counseling someone grieving, he slipped his hand down her sweater. We’ve received many e-mails and letters of late spelling out Rabbi Max’s good deeds here, as well as his flaws. They seem split between “Thank goodness this fraud has been exposed; he did it to me 25 years ago” and “How dare you publish a tabloid-like story about this great man who is now 85 years old.” There is tremendous sadness when a great man falls. Everyone loses. However, the anger at the BALTIMORE JEWISH TIMES, while not surprising, is misplaced. Not with glee, but with respect for our responsibilities, we plow ahead with such work. The decline of newspapers has led to grave concern from all walks of life—from government to business leaders—that professional journalists are often the ones who expose crimes, from Watergate to Enron. Law enforcement often lags behind the work of reporters. In fact, we have followed the Rabbi Max story for more than two years, fielding unrelated phone calls from a psychotherapist telling us about her client who was an alleged victim, to a woman who moved out of state telling us her alleged tale of abuse. We considered reporting the alleged inappropriate and illegal behavior back then; but the alleged victims wanted anonymity, partially from fear about exposing the esteemed rabbi. We decided to speak with Rabbi Max off-the-record to let him know about the allegations, but not print the story. That reveals the integrity of Executive Editor Phil Jacobs. Now a non-Jewish victim has come forward and won a conviction against Rabbi Max, so we reported on it. Like the old, unanswered question, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it really make a sound?” had we ignored the verdict, Rabbi Max might still be able to abuse women. That’s because he did not receive jail time, although it was possible. Now, with the community alerted, women can take precautions. These are challenging times for the media. Our dual problem of people receiving news from the Internet and a brutal advertising recession has wreaked havoc on the industry. Locally, the deep-pocketed daily The Examiner recently closed, the Sun just eliminated 61 more reporting positions, and theOwings Mills Times is switching from a weekly to a monthly. Yet, we’re still doing what we’ve done for 90 years. Someone has to shine the light on the flaws and triumphs of our community and its leadership. That news will not come from Google, which uses our content to make their money. It will not come from local bloggers. Sadly, it will not come from the Sun, which consistently follows our lead in matters involving our geographical area. By the way, we sell virtually the same number of copies if we have the Associated’s Marc Terrill or a sexual abuse story on the cover. Nor do we financially benefit from a huge spike in Web traffic. The extra $2 in Google revenue from advertisements barely buys our reporters a cup of coffee. We do all this because it’s our mission. Now, with fewer local resources in town to do this, that’s more important than ever. So we can take the name calling; we know our community is better off with us watching it. We need to do that. It’s what good media does.
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