A dozen members of a Brooklyn-based Satmar family and other associates within a tight-knit Hasidic community were charged Thursday with exaggerating their wealth to rip off lenders for more than $20 million in mortgages — while also claiming they were broke to collect food stamps and other benefits for the poor.
“They alternately played the part of prince or pauper depending on which scam was being perpetrated,” Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara said at a White Plains conference with other law-enforcement officials.
The welfare fraud allegedly totaled $700,000 in benefits.
Most of the suspects were members of the Rubin family, including Abraham Rubin, 51, recently released from prison after pleading guilty to offering a $500,000 bribe to silence a victim in a notorious sex-abuse case against convicted Hasidic counselor Nechemya Weberman.
Eleven defendants live in Brooklyn while most of the others live in Kiryas Joel in upstate Monroe.
Yehuda Rubin, described in the indictment as “an organizer,” and lead defendant Irving Rubin, pleaded not guilty in White Plains federal court.