Former Brookline Rabbi Decides Not To Plead Guilty To Molesting Children
BOSTON (CBS) - A rabbi who once taught at a prestigious local school decided not to plead guilty Wednesday to molesting three young children in the 1970's.
WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Carl Stevens reports.
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Rabbi Stanley Levitt, who taught at the Maimonides School in Brookline, would have been asked to serve three years probation for the guilty plea, but instead will go on trial next May.
The judge was angry with Levitt's change-of-course decision, saying that the victims had traveled so far for nothing. Levitt was originally expected to enter a guilty plea.
WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Carl Stevens said that one of the alleged victims called the rabbi "a coward" for backing out of the plea.
The case began when one of the rabbi's students, Michael Brecher, told prosecutors that Levitt molested him when he was 11 years old.
The other two accusers have not gone public.
Levitt, who is now 65 years old, left the Boston area in 1980, so the statute of limitations did not run out.
He has been living in Baltimore recently.
He was indicted in 2009 on four counts of indecent assault and battery.
