Lev Tahor leaders receive sentences for child kidnapping and sex trafficking

Brothers Yakov, Shmiel, and Yoil Weingarten, all members of Lev Tahor, were convicted of kidnapping two child siblings in New York and smuggling them into Mexico. Prosecutors said their ultimate goal was to take the children to their religious compound in Guatemala, where the 14-year-old girl’s adult husband was waiting for her.

In 2017, the cult’s leaders arranged for the young girl, then 12-years-old, to be married to an 18-year-old member. The following year, however, the mother decided it was no longer safe to remain in Lev Tahor.

The apostate fled Guatemala and arrived in the U.S. in November 2018, where she was shortly thereafter joined by her six children. Authorities granted her sole custody and prohibited the father, a Lev Tahor leader, from communicating with them.

Soon after, however, the Weingartens conspired to kidnap the young girl, now 14, and forcibly take her back to the compound. In December 2018, they stole the girl and her 12-year-old brother and trafficked them into Mexico.

“The sentencing of the Weingarten brothers holds them accountable for kidnapping children from their mother in the middle of the night, including for the purpose of coercing a child into a sexual relationship with an adult,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said. “This Office will do everything in its power to protect children and use every available tool to investigate and prosecute those who sexually exploit them.”

Internationally recognized as a cult, Lev Tahor follows its own strict, fundamentalist interpretations of the Jewish religion. Several of its members have faced convictions for kidnapping, human trafficking, and child rape charges.

Prosecutors said that the Weingartens required that child brides under their control obediently had sex with their adult members, and lied to outsiders about their age and marriage status. In cases where a girl became pregnant, deliveries were carried out in the compound, instead of a hospital with medical care, so as to conceal their ages from the proper authorities.

The group’s hierarchy have frequently relocated to different countries over the years in order to escape law enforcement and child services. For decades they operated in the U.S. and Canada but now have an established presence in Guatemala.

Authorities said that the initial parts of their plan succeeded thanks to their use of disguises, aliases, burner phones, and fake travel documents.

The Weingartens were on the run in Mexico for three weeks, before a joint law enforcement manhunt across North and Latin America took them into custody and rescued the children.

Authorities said that other members of Lev Tahor attempted to kidnap the girl in 2019 and 2021, but were unsuccessful.

Yakov, Shmiel, and Yoil ultimately received sentences of 12 to 14 years in prison for child sexual exploitation and kidnapping. Following their prison terms, they will also be subject to five years of supervised release.