NEW YORK (JTA) — A Brooklyn rabbi and his brother pleaded guilty to federal housing fraud.
Rabbi Leib Glantz, a prominent member of the Satmar Chasidic community, and his brother, Menashe, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to signing false statements in New York Housing Authority documents to obtain benefits from the federal government’s Section 8 program. The program offers subsidies for low-income housing tenants.
According to The New York Times, the rabbi lived in an apartment that his brother had applied for through Section 8, while the federal subsidies were paid to the United Talmudical Academy, which is headed by the rabbi. The documents for the apartment in question were signed from 1996 to 2000.
The Glantz brothers took in $220,000 over 15 years in housing subsidies, making theirs the largest individual case of tenant fraud seen by New York City’s Department of Investigation, according to The New York Times.
The sentencing, scheduled for Jan. 25, is expected to amount to up to one year in prison for the rabbi and a maximum of 10 years for his brother.
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