Rabbi’s Aide Gets 22 Months for Molesting Girl on Flight
A New York rabbi’s assistant who pleaded guilty to sexually molesting a teenage girl on a flight across the Pacific Ocean was sentenced to 22 months in federal prison Friday, despite a sobbing plea for mercy from his wife and his own remorseful statement in court.
Yehudah Friedlander, assistant to New York Rabbi Israel Grunwald, stood silently as U.S. District Judge J. Spencer Letts announced the sentence in Los Angeles.
Friedlander made a brief statement to the court before hearing the judge’s decision.
“My reputation and my life as I knew it is gone,” said Friedlander, 44. “What I did to this victim and all other victims in this case, such as my family, is inexcusable.”
Friedlander and Grunwald were arrested at Los Angeles International Airport in May on charges that they had molested the 16-year-old on a flight from Australia. Charges against Grunwald were dropped.
Friedlander is scheduled to begin serving his sentence Feb. 20.
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