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Rabbi Is Deported 5 Years After Conviction, Lawyer Says


A Hasidic rabbi on parole in Rockland County after serving a prison term for kidnapping a teenager under his tutelage was deported to Israel yesterday, even as his conviction was being appealed, his lawyer said.


The case of the rabbi, Shlomo Helbrans, has drawn widespread attention not only for the nature of the kidnapping charge, but also because of a federal investigation into whether his parole after two years in prison was the result of improper political influence on the Pataki administration.


U.S. Asks Whether Leniency for Rabbi Had Link to a Pataki Backer


Federal prosecutors are examining whether state officials gave lenient treatment to a Hasidic rabbi imprisoned in a widely publicized kidnapping case after appeals were made on his behalf by a fund-raiser for the campaign of Gov. George E. Pataki, officials and others involved in the inquiry say.


State records show that prison officials moved the rabbi, Shlomo Helbrans, from prison into a work-release program even though he was ineligible for the transfer because Federal immigration officials wanted to deport him. The transfer in June 1996 was rescinded after a Federal prosecutor who had brought charges against Rabbi Helbrans protested to state prison officials.


Computer Replaces Razor for Rabbi's Prison Picture


A conflict between a New York State prison regulation requiring that inmates be photographed clean-shaven and a religious belief that a man's beard must not be touched was resolved in Federal court yesterday through the latest computer technology.


For the first time, New York State accepted a computer-generated image of what an inmate, in this case, Rabbi Shlomo Helbrans, would look like without a beard instead of making him shave for a conventional photograph. The state requires that a bearded inmate be photographedshaven so that he can be more easily identified if he escapes and shaves off his beard.


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