Orthodox Jewish Wife Abused By Husband Tells US Court He Let Daughter Play With His Genitals

A young mother broke down on the stand on Wednesday as she described her sad ordeals in her 4-year-old marriage.

Daily Mail reports;

Rivky Stein, 25, testified at King’s County Supreme Court in Brooklyn, New York, in a civil case against her estranged husband Yoel Weiss, 32.

Ms Stein sobbed as she recalled how in January 2011, her husband sent her to work in Canada with his brother in an effort to control her. She went but refused to work while there which lead to brutal punishments at her husband’s hands, she told the court.

‘Whenever I refused anything from Yoel, he raped me, physically hurt me, verbally abused me and threatened me,’ Ms Stein said.

‘He threatened to take my kids away from me. I didn’t agree to go to Canada. He held my son against my will and I went with my daughter. He said if I ever want to see my son again, I should do as he says.’

The civil case, which began last month, will determine the custody of the couple’s five-year-old son and daughter, four; child support payments; and alimony for Ms Stein.

Ms. Stein said that she wants the court to award her full custody of the children with supervised visitation with their father ‘in a healthy way’.

When asked about her concerns over her husband’s visits with her children, Ms Stein testified that when her daughter was 22 months old, her husband came out of the shower naked and ‘put his private parts in her hand for her to play with’.

Ms Stein said that she had not witnessed any other similar incidents but claimed Mr Weiss had posted videos of their children on YouTube.

In a separate matter, Ms Stein, who is an Orthodox Jew, continues to seek her get – a religious divorce which can only be granted with her husband’s approval.

Ms Stein therefore lives as an ‘agunah’, a chained wife, unable to marry again in an Orthodox synagogue.

She told Daily Mail Online on Wednesday: ‘He has continuously refused to give me a get. I don’t know what I can do any more I have tried everything: Jewish court, Beis din rabbis and mediators but he refuses. He said he will never give me a Get, and that I will die old and alone.’

Brendan Lyle, CEO of divorce finance company BBL Churchill, is an expert in divorce cases and has met with Ms Stein and her rabbi.

He told Daily Mail Online: ‘While the court can not force Mr Weiss to grant the Get, they do have several tools at their disposal to make him think twice if he doesn’t provide Rivky with the get that she deserves.’

The 25-year-old told the court that her children meant everything to her – and are the only reason she has kept up her court battle for three years.

‘They are the reason that I wake up in the morning. They are the loves of my life. I have been in court for three years and it’s very stressful but I do it because they are my babies and I want what’s best for them,’ she said.

In court on Wednesday, she described the ‘escape’ from her marriage with her two children on July 2, 2012.

‘I made some phone calls which I was scared to do because Yoel checked my phone but I prayed really hard to God that he wouldn’t check it until later. I called my former foster mother and she told me to come back to her. I called a car when Yoel went out. I went with a friend to get an order of protection from the court.’

Ms Stein no longer has a court order of protection, but said: ‘He has threatened me many times, telling me that he was going to take my kids, break me, put me in a mental institution.’

During a court appearance on January 22, Ms Stein testified that after she married Weiss at the age of 18, he raped her, punched her in the stomach when she was pregnant and locked her outside the home in the freezing cold.

She also told the court that her husband starved her and their two young children while holding them prisoner at her in-laws’ home. She says was locked away in a room with her two children. ‘We got roughly two meals a day, normally reused chicken soup.’

She testified that she had approached rabbis about the physical abuse by her husband, adding: ‘I would ask them what I should do and if I had permission to call the police. They told me that I can’t. They wouldn’t give me permission to.’

In an interview with Daily Mail Online last June, Ms Stein described the years of physical torture and mind games she said she had endured.

She claimed on her wedding night as a naive teenager that Weiss, the ‘charming and spiritual’ man she believed she had married, was a violent and malevolent force who took pleasure in watching her suffer.

‘The night of the wedding, he made it clear that he owned me and that night he forced himself on me.’

The young mother’s fight to be free of her marriage continues today although the civil court judge who is overseeing proceedings, Esther Morgenstern, has warned Mr Weiss in court that she will order him to pay lifetime alimony if he does not agree to it.

Judge Morgenstern herself says she struggled to obtain a Get before she divorced her husband in 1987.

The majority of Wednesday’s proceedings dealt with years of unpaid wages that Ms Stein claims she is owed by for working from ‘morning until night’ in her husband’s factories, pizza shop and restaurant.

She also testified that Mr Weiss was hiding ‘hundreds of thousands of dollars’ by relatives’ bank accounts and bragged to her about ‘beating the system and the IRS’.

Ms Stein was questioned by her lawyer Joel Banuelos, of Mishcon de Reya, as her estranged husband, Mr Weiss, looked on alongside his attorney, Jeffrey Berke.

On Wednesday morning, Mr Weiss was reprimanded by Judge Morgenstern to put away his laptop. As his wife gave her testimony, he stared at the ceiling and flashed smiles around the room.

The court also heard evidence of large cash deposits and withdrawals made to Ms Stein’s bank account which she claimed took place without her knowledge.

For two years, tens of thousands of dollars were deposited or withdrawn on a monthly basis in transactions with Amazon.com, Sears Retail, American Express, Con Edison and the National Grid. Miss Stein said she has never held accounts with any of these companies.

Mr Weiss refused to comment on the trial outside court on Wednesday but offered to share ‘hundreds’ of videos of his wife which he claimed contradicted the testimony she had given in court.

Outside court, Miss Stein said: ‘I just want to move on from this nightmare but I refuse to give up my children in the process.’

Mr Banuelos added: ‘It was another emotional day in court but it was an opportunity for Miss Stein to share her story.’

The trial continues on March 16.