Former Students File $380 Million Sex Abuse Lawsuit Against Yeshiva University

New York - A $380M lawsuit has been filed against Yeshiva University by nineteen former high school students who claim teachers and administrators actively engaged in a “massive cover-up” of physical and Sexual abuse of students during the 1970s and 1980s at a Manhattan high school run by the university.

The JEWISH DAILY FORWARD Reports that suit centers around Y.U.‘s handling of repeated reports of SGeorge Finkelstein, and Talmud teacher, Rabbi Macy Gordon.

exual abuse by former administrator, Rabbi

According to Kevin Mulhearn, the attorney representing the nineteen former students, the first hurdle the suit has to conquer will be circumventing the current New York statute of limitations which states that both criminal and civil lawsuits involving the sexual abuse of a child must be filed before the victim’s 23rd birthday.

But Mulhearn, who has been successful in circumventing the statute once before, said he plans to argue that the statute of limitations is “not applicable” in this case due to the fact that Yeshiva University “fraudulently covered-up” the abuse.

Mulhearn said that because of the cover-up, there was “no way” victims could have been aware that other victims even existed, or, that Y.U. was actively engaged in a cover-up.

Court papers say that victimization has resulted in years of physical and mental turbulence for many of the Mulhearn’s clients, with many of them suffering from depression, substance abuse, failed marriages, the inability to sustain employment, and in a few cases, attempted suicide.

The lawsuit, which was filed Monday in U.S. District Court in White Plains, is extremely thorough in naming former administrators, trustees, directors and faculty members as defendants, including former Y.U. President Rabbi Robert Lamm, and former Vice-President of Y.U.‘s theological seminary Rabbi Robert Hirt.