Guatemalan authorities extradited a man identified as one of the leaders of the Lev Tahor sect—who holds dual Israeli and Romanian citizenship—to Mexico, where he is facing trial on charges related to organized crime and human trafficking, including allegations of forced marriages involving minors.
Mexican officials said that Yoel Alter was transferred into Mexican custody and brought before a federal judge in the state of Chiapas in the south of the country. The judge ordered that he remain in custody pending a review of his legal status.
According to Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office, Alter is accused of involvement in a criminal organization that removed children from their communities and arranged forced marriages between minors and adults within the sect. Authorities said the investigation identified Chiapas, a southern Mexican state bordering Guatemala, as a central area of the organization’s activities.
Members of the criminal organization frequently crossed borders—including Israel, the United States, Guatemala, and Mexico—in order to evade law-enforcement authorities. Mexican authorities have previously removed children from Lev Tahor compounds as part of ongoing criminal investigations.
Alter’s defense team requested additional time before a formal ruling on the charges. A court hearing is expected to take place in the coming days.
Guatemalan authorities emphasized that the alleged crimes will not be subject to a statute of limitations until 2052.
In November, Colombian authorities, in a joint operation with immigration officials, rescued at least 17 minors from the cult who were staying at a hotel in Yarumal, Antioquia. Five of those minors, from the United States, Canada, and Guatemala, were subject to international arrest warrants issued by Interpol on charges of kidnapping and human trafficking.
(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)
Join the official YWN WhatsApp status
6 Responses
Who is more reprehensible & heinous & despicable:-
1) Lev Tahor?
2) Naturei Karta?
3) The followers of Moreinu HoRav Eliezer Berland שליט”א?
…For ALLEGED Human Trafficking??? ALLEGED?
For human trafficking — period. Not ‘alleged.’ The media has become obsessed with hiding behind that word. Most of the time a person is either guilty or not, and constantly soft-pedaling crimes with ‘alleged’ only blurs accountability.
Joseph Goebbels,
When are you leaving for Mexico to help your hero, the human-trafficking “tzadik”?
B”H
I believe Rabbi Shlomo Helbrans, A”H, was murdered and made to look like an accidental drowning. Impoverished Mexicans will kill for pennies down there. All they needed to do was give one of this genre scuba gear, tell him where the Rabbi would be going to toivel, and wait for him there under water and then pull him down for 2-3 minutes until he drowned. Oh, I forgot, and cut the gartel and drag the body away (they said the gartel was cut by a rock – oh yeah, and the dog ate my homework teacher). It not unreasonably follows that there would be even greater difficulties and hardships for his followers thereafter, such as further attemps made to discredit them, such as the “liberation” of children from their parents last year libeling them as victims of abuse – even babies torn from their nursing mothers. Why not attack all the millions of non-religious Jews living in America and elsewhere for intermarriage, adultery, and living contrary to the Torah. Why keep assailing this hapless organization? Pick on someone your own size.
Ani Yosef, you’re obviously very ignorant.
B”H
Anyone that doesn’t give serious consideration to the fact that Rabbi Shlomo Helbrans was murdered and it was made to look accidental, are themselves amei ha’aratzim and shouldn’t be commenting about others.