Man Pleads Guilty to Offering $500k Bribe to Silence Weberman Sex Abuse Victim

By Oren Yaniv
New York Daily News
August 21, 2013

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/man-pleads-guilty-offering-500k-bribe-silence-weberman-sex-abuse-victim-article-1.1432936

Abraham Rubin, 48, of Wiliamsburg, Brooklyn, pleaded guilty to attempting to bribe the husband of a sex abuse victim with more than $500,000 in cash.

A Brooklyn Hasid admitted Wednesday to offering $500,000 to buy the silence of victim in a sensational sex abuse case - but the cash-flush offender may still skirt jail time.

Abraham Rubin, 49, acknowledged offering the hefty sum to the husband of a teenage girl who testified against Satmar counselor Nechemya Weberman, pleading guilty in Brooklyn Supreme Court to a felony of bribing a witness.

The couple declined the bribe and the 18-year-old took the stand for four days last winter, sealing Weberman's conviction on 59 counts in a high-profile trial that highlighted abuse in the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community and intimidation of those who report it. Weberman is currently serving a 50-year prison sentence.

While prosecutors offered Rubin a deal of six months in jail plus five-year probation, Justice Danny Chun agreed to the defense's request and will consider giving a lesser or no jail time at the Oct. 29 sentencing.

"The People expressed their objection," the judge said. "The defendant may very well get the sentence the People have been offering all along."

Rubin approached Boorey Deutsch on June 2010, offering the money to make him and his then-girlfriend leave the country.

"Rubin didn't care about Weberman's victims," Deutsch told the Daily News Wednesday. "All he cared about was that this monster Weberman be out of jail."

While the victim's husband said the man who offered him hush money should be locked up, he was fine with him avoiding the pokey.

"I'm sure he will never ever try to bribe anyone ever again," said Deutsch. "And that's a lesson to the entire community that we won't stand down to anyone trying to intimidate or bribe a victim of abuse."

Asked for a comment after the plea, Rubin cryptically told a reporter: "I don't consider you my friend."

The confessed briber then left the courthouse counting a wad of cash.