A private religious school in the small Hasidic Jewish village of New Square, N.Y., must pay a $3.25 million contempt fine, a federal judge has ordered.
The judge held the Yeshiva of New Square in civil contempt last year for failing to cooperate with a federal investigation into possible tax evasion and misuse of federal housing and education funds. The fine assessed by the judge was suspended last spring while a court-appointed receiver tried to sort through the yeshiva’s finances. Meanwhile, the K-12 school closed, and its 2,000 students were transferred to a newly created religious school. (See Education Week, Jan. 24, 1996.)
On Feb. 14, though, U.S. District Judge Leonard B. Sand of New York City ordered the fine to be collected because, he said, yeshiva leaders gave him the impression they believed they had beaten the system by evading federal investigation.
