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Queens Rabbi & Associates Indicted for Stealing $12.4M Intended for Disabled Jewish Children

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The ICDC provides special education for young orthodox Jewish children.
The ICDC provides special education for young orthodox Jewish children.
Rabbi Samuel Hiller, Ira Kurman, Roy Hoffman, and Daniel Laniado from the Island Child Development Center (ICDC) in Queens, a non-profit special education provider for Orthodox Jewish children,  have been indicted for stealing $12.4 million of the institution’s $27 million state-funded budget between 2005 and 2012. The charges claim they siphoned off the funds, public aid for the institution, and were using the money for themselves and  personal business interests.

The four men face criminal charges in a 42-count indictment, including grand larceny, identity theft, and falsifying business records, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said in a statement.

If convicted, each faces up to 25 years in prison.

“It is disheartening to see a betrayal of the magnitude alleged in this indictment,” Brown said in a statement, echoing (if perhaps toning down the rhetoric a bit) the community’s outrage over the allegations.

Rabbi Samuel Hiller, who acted as the center’s assistant director, and Roy Hoffman, the center’s independent auditor, were accused of using the money to repair and spruce up their homes. Hoffman spent $300,000 for a redesign of his house, and funneled another $15,000 to his wife’s cosmetics business. And Hiller spent $30,000 on plumbing work for his home, Brown said.

In addition, Rabbi Hiller is also being accused of diverting $8 million to a number of religious schools and camps, unrelated to his work at the ICDC, including $3 million to B’nos Bais Yaakov Academy—a private all-girls school where he is the principal.

The scam came to light in July 2012, when the state’s comptroller notified Kurman, the Executive Director at ICDC, that it would conduct a routine audit of the Special Education Itinerant Teachers’ (SEIT) funds. But when the auditors showed up for the meeting, Kurman resigned and appeared to have fled with the records.  Suspicions were aroused, and the fraud was uncovered.

“These individuals allegedly stole millions of taxpayer dollars meant for special needs children in a brazen disregard for common decency and the law,” said state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.

In the indictment, Kurman stood accused of making more than $143,000 in loans to community members, including payments to a caterer in exchange for discounts for his daughter’s wedding and his son’s Bar Mitzvah.

The fourth culprit, Daniel Laniado, best viewed as an investor in the center, stands accused of liquidating more than $1 million of checks meant to benefit the center.

In addition to the criminal charges, the District Attorney’s office is seeking to have the stolen money returned, of which $1 million has already been repaid.

ICDC is one of the city’s largest providers of special education services for disabled children, between the ages of 3 and 5. It primarily serves the Orthodox Jewish communities of Far Rockaway in Queens, and Williamsburg and Borough Park, in Brooklyn.

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