Lev Tahor leaders convicted: kidnapping + child exploitation (forced child marriage)

Cited record

Sources

JNS (2024) 'Three Lev Tahor leaders convicted of child exploitation, kidnapping', Jewish News Syndicate. Available at: jns.org (Accessed: 14 July 2026).

'Three leaders of the Guatemala-based Jewish extremist group Lev Tahor (“pure heart”)—Yoil Weingarten, Yakov Weingarten and Shmiel Weingarten—were convicted of child exploitation and kidnapping.' The US Justice Department stated: 'The defendants' conduct—which included forced child marriages, physical beatings and family separations—is unthinkable and has caused irreparable harm to children in their formative years.'

The Times of Israel (2022) 'Lev Tahor cult leader sentenced to 12 years for kidnapping, child exploitation', The Times of Israel. Available at: timesofisrael.com (Accessed: 14 July 2026).

'A US federal court sentenced the leader of the extremist Jewish Lev Tahor cult to 12 years imprisonment on Thursday for six convictions including child sexual exploitation and kidnapping. Nachman Helbrans, 40, was convicted of the crimes by the federal Southern District of New York court in November... Around 2017, Helbrans had arranged for the girl, his niece, to be ‘married’ to an adult from the group.'

prosecuting authority · disposition U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York, “Senior Leaders of Lev Tahor Sect Sentenced to 14 and 12 Years in Prison” (July 10, 2024).

The prosecuting authority records the Weingarten brothers’ March 2024 jury convictions and July sentences, the kidnapping of two children, and the effort to return a fourteen-year-old to a religious child marriage with an adult.