David Kaye (former rabbi)

Before getting caught in the sting, David Kaye worked as a rabbi. After working as a rabbi and confirmation teacher for Congregation Har Shalom in Potomac, Maryland, until 2001, Kaye joined as vice president for the Institute for Jewish Leaders and Values, a high school youth program which brought thousands of Jewish students around the United States to Washington D.C. each year for religious and political instruction.[1][2][3]

Kaye began an Internet chat with a boy he thought to be 13 years of age.[2][3] The boy was actually a 26-year-old man who was paid by Perverted Justice, an organization that seeks to identify adults who try to engage in sexual conduct with children online.[4] Kaye talked to the child about sex, revealed that he was gay, recommended that they meet, and sent the child images of himself naked. The decoy claimed to live in Herndon, Virginia, so Kaye set up a meeting there.[3][5] On August 17, 2005,[2][6] Kaye traveled from Maryland to the sting house and instead of meeting a real child, he was met by Dateline NBC reporter Chris Hansen as he entered the home's kitchen.[1][6] Hansen began questioning Kaye about his usage of the internet and his presence at the house without identifying himself as a journalist.[1] When Kaye asked him who he is for the second time, Hansen said that he was with Dateline and that the program was recording a report about men who enter online chat rooms in search of children for sex called To Catch a Predator.[1]

Following the sting, no criminal charges were brought against Kaye at first.[1][3][5] The episode Kaye was caught in aired on November 4, 2005.[1][3][5] After admitting to his congregation that he might be exposed for acting inappropriately on a national television news program, he resigned from his position as a rabbi.[1][3][5] In response to a question from The Washington Post, Kaye stated that he had quit for personal reasons but did not go into further detail. Perverted Justice sent the chat logs and information on Kaye to the Fairfax County police.[1][3][5] In May 2006, Kaye was arrested and charged with coercion and enticement and travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual contact with a minor, both felonies that carried sentences of up to 60 years in prison.[2][6]

Prosecutors revealed evidence of sexually explicit discussions between him and the child during a two-day bench hearing in September 2006.[4] During his trial, Kaye admitted that he went to the house with the intention of having sex, but he also stated that he had always thought the person he was speaking to was an adult pretending to be 13 years old.[4] While Kaye admitted that he frequently had gay encounters with persons he encountered in online chat rooms, he argued that none of them involved children.[4][7] He claimed that for many years, he kept his homosexual conduct from his wife of more than 30 years.[4][7] Kaye was found guilty on both felony charges in federal court.[4][7] According to U.S. district judge James C. Cacheris' report, the prosecution provided a lot of evidence, including NBC recordings and a log of chats that Kaye started with the child.[4][7] The judge stated that after being questioned, Kaye said to Hansen, "You know I'm in trouble. I know I'm in trouble."[4][7]

His sentencing was set for December 1, 2006.[2][7] The former rabbi said at his sentencing that having intercourse with the boy was "a cry out for help to face my inner difficulties."[4] Kaye cried as he addressed his wheelchair-bound father, who was sitting in the courtroom.[4] He said his conviction had forced him to accept "the reality of who I am. I know I need help. I pray that God allows me to get that help."[4] Peter D. Greenspun, Kaye's lawyer, requested that his client receive a sentence at the lower range of the federal standards.[4] Judge Cacheris sentenced Kaye to six and a half years in prison.[4][8] He was also given ten years of supervised release by the judge.[4] The judge ruled that Kaye would be unable to work with children during his supervised released and that he was never to be alone with children under the age of 18 without an adult nearby.[4]

Kaye was freed from jail in January 2012 after spending time in a Baltimore transitional home in Bethesda, Maryland. Kaye made an effort to join the Adat Shalom Reconstructionist Congregation. The board took Kaye's choices into account. Two other congregations had sent him away, but two other Jewish organizations had welcomed him. When the board met in an executive session to vote in June 2012, its members were unable to come to an agreement on a set of terms that would let Kaye to stay at the synagogue. Kaye was notified by a friend that he was ordered by board to leave.[9][10]

An email was issued to the congregation on September 12, 2012. After spending "backbreaking time" investigating and debating the legal and moral problems raised, including the "safety of our children, responsibility, repentance, and the compelling needs of the community at large," the board had decided that Kaye would  not be accepted. Kaye had been attending Shabbat services at Adat Shalom since February 2012. He thought that since Dateline NBC occasionally replayed the sting, which started the conversation among the congregation about his presence, someone there may have identified him. Even while he agreed that the problems are challenging to fix, Kaye told The Washington Post that he was unhappy by Adat Shalom's choice to refuse him. He said he would accept their choice and carry on with his life.[9][10]