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A leader of an Orthodox Jewish sect in New York was sentenced Tuesday to 103 years in prison for sexually abusing a young girl, capping a scandal that lifted the lid on the Hasidic group's parallel society.
Nechemya Weberman, a prominent figure in the ultra-strict Satmar branch of Hasidic Jews, was convicted of abusing the girl over the course of three years in the Brooklyn neighborhood where their community has a huge enclave and he worked as an unlicensed counselor.
Ahead of the judge's sentencing, the victim told the court that Weberman acted "without the slightest bit of mercy," leaving her as "a girl who didn't want to live in her own skin."
The case caused an uproar in the Satmar community, shattering a code of silence imposed by the group's insistence on dealing with matters internally and not going to the police.
"If there is one message to take away from this case, it is that this office will pursue the evil of sexual abuse of a child no matter where it occurs," District Attorney Charles Hynes said.