Planned Sale of Beloved LES Synagogue Raises Multiple Red Flags - New York Observer
A mysterious deal to sell a shul out from under its members and donate more than three-quarters of the proceeds to a small unrelated sect in Israel has raised so many red flags that it looks like a rally in Tiananmen Square. There’s a hearing next Wednesday—April 15—in the New York State Supreme Court before a judge who will be asked to approve the $13 million sale of Home of the Sages, a venerable synagogue/nursing home at 25 Bialystoker Place just south of Delancey... As a nonprofit, the Home of Sages needs a “Leave of the Court” to finalize its sale. Also intriguing is that the institution—a nonprofit selling a building for the tiny-by-New-York-City-standards price of $13 million—is represented by Patrick Rohan at the law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner. Why is a partner at a superstar law firm representing the seller in a transaction that’s less than half what many high-end condos sell for these days in Manhattan. This story will be updated if he weighs in. ). The deal first began to percolate about a year and a half before Mr. Rapfogel went to jail in 2014. All of the institutions and the land involved fall under the jurisdiction of the Attorney General’s... Source: observer.com
