Roots from page B11
Name: Leonid "Lenny" Feller.
Age: 31.
Home: Oakland County.
Family: wife, Lisa; children Lucas, 3,
Logan, 21 months. Parents, Emilia
and Emil Feller, and in-laws, Pam
Radzinski and Isaac Radzinski; all
live locally.
Education: West Bloomfield High
School graduate, 1993; University of
Michigan, bachelor's in political sci-
ence and economics, 1996; Harvard
University, juris doctor, 2000.
Synagogue: Temple Israel, West
Bloomfield.
Charitable Causes: Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan Detroit,
Bloomfield Township; U.S. Holocaust
Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C.
munity was another incentive to come
back. It's where Feller and his wife grew
up. "Chicago unquestionably has a strong
and vibrant Jewish community, but it
wasn't our Jewish community," Lenny said.
Lisa added, "It is especially meaningful
to us to see our children not only attend
the synagogue where Lenny and I attend-
ed Hebrew school, but also develop a rela-
tionship with the rabbis that married us."
Detroit is special to the Fellers. "Moving
back to Detroit has given us the oppor-
tunity to celebrate our Judaism with our
closest family and friends and give our
children the opportunity to learn about
Judaism from their grandparents:' Feller
said.
The Fellers attend Temple Israel in West
Bloomfield and have taken part in that
West Bloomfield synagogue's Imagine pro-
grams for young adults. With two young
children, family outings often consist of
birthday parties at My Gym and trips
to Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook and the
Detroit Zoo in Royal Oak. The Fellers also
are fans of University of Michigan football
and Detroit's professional sports teams.
Lenny grew up at Temple Israel and was
active in the youth group. He visited Israel
with the synagogue in 1992.
Feller also cut his spiritual spurs at
camp. From 1987 to 1990, he attended
Michigan's Tamarack Camps. He attended
Kutz Camp, a Reform movement camp in
Warwick, N.Y., in 1991; he was a counselor
there in 1993.
The Fellers count Holocaust education
among their key endeavors, given that
Lisa's paternal grandparents and other
relatives jumped off a train headed for
Treblinka and both of Lenny's grandfa-
thers fought in World War II for the Soviet
Union against Nazi Germany.
The tug of Jewish Detroit isn't lost on
Lenny Feller.
As he put it, "Just the chance to be
Jewish brought my parents from the
Soviet Union to Detroit. The chance to be
part of the Jewish community in which I
was raised brought my family back from
Chicago to Detroit." ❑
High-Profile Cases
Current:
• The Detroit Thug Lordz, a nine-
defendant case involving an armed
street gang alleged to sell crack
cocaine, powder cocaine and mari-
juana.
• The AK-47 Bandits, five defendants
alleged to be responsible for 10 bank
robberies netting $550,000. The
lead defendant is alleged to have
shot a Detroit police officer and a
bank teller.
• A defendant alleged to have taken
photographs of himself molesting his
9-year-old daughter and her friends
during sleepovers.
Previous:
• Sisaye Dinssa admitted to fund-
ing the Oromo Liberation Front, an
Ethiopian separatist group, and was
sentenced to 12 months' imprison-
ment after smuggling $78,000
into Detroit Metropolitan Airport in
Romulus with articles about the fail-
ure of nuclear power plants.
• John Gdyra, a personal banker at
Comerica Bank in Detroit, was sen-
tenced to 3 1/2 years' imprisonment
after embezzling $360,000 from the
surviving spouses of his 70- to 90-
year-old clients.
GALLERY of West Bloomfield
A unique Oriental Rug Store
filled with the finest hand made
rugs from India,
Pakistan, China and Persia.
Such as Kashan, Tabriz,
Isfahan and many more.
6335 Orchard Lake Rd.
West Bloomfield, MI 48323
On Orchard Lake Road just North of Maple.
Mon-Sat 10-6 • Thurs. 10-8 • Sun 12-5
B12
February 14 • 2008
Melton Names Director
The board of directors of the Florence
Melton Adult Mini-School have named
Rabbi Loren Sykes, 41, as the director
of the North American Division of the
Florence Melton Adult Mini-School. Sykes
will commence his position on Aug. 1.
Sykes was the founding executive direc-
tor of Camp Ramah Darom in Georgia
and has a record of educational leader-
ship and innovation. He is a fellow at the
Senior Educators Program of the Melton
Center for Jewish Education and is study-
ing under the tutorship of Dr. Jonathan
Mirvis, the international director of the
Mini-School.
Teacher Is Honored
Leonard H.
Schiffman of
Novi has been
selected to receive
the 2008 Dr.
William C. Morse
Teacher of the
Year Award. This
state-level award
is given by the
Michigan Council
Schiffman
of Exceptional
Children and will be presented to him at
its 2008 Conference in Grand Rapids.
Schiffman has been teaching for more
than 30 years and is working with the
severely cognitively impaired students
at the Kingsley Montgomery School in
Waterford.