From Manchester Crown Court comes a moving and inspiring tale, which demonstrates that members of Britain’s troubled faith communities can find common ground:
A rabbi set up in business as a drug dealer and lavished his supplies of cocaine on young prostitutes at parties, a jury was told yesterday.
Rabbi Baruch Chalomish, 54, bearded and wearing a trilby hat, shared the dock at Manchester Crown Court with an interpreter who occasionally translated the barristers’ words into Hebrew.
He was said by the prosecution to be a wealthy man who took up with Nasir Abbas, also 54, a convicted dealer, who had the “knowhow” and the contacts in the drug trade. The rabbi was the financier in the operation. They set up their “commercial cocaine-supply operation” in an hotel service flat in Shudehill, Manchester, where, it is alleged, Chalomish liked to dispense the drug in return for “sexual favours”.
Chalomish, a part of Greater Manchester’s Orthodox Jewish community, denies two charges of supplying cocaine but admits two counts of possession. Mr Abbas, who did not turn up for the trial, faces charges of possessing the Class A controlled drug with intent to supply.
This is wonderful news for those of us who care about community cohesion.
As John Denham recently opined:
“Faith is a strong and powerful source of honesty, solidarity, generosity – the very values which are essential to politics, to our economy and our society.”
Surely these men are a shoe in to join John’s new panel of religious experts?
At the very least, these men should receive a grant from the PVE fund.
