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Bais Chabad Torah Center
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D.C.-Bound?

Chabad of Michigan will attempt to
appeal its case to U.S. Supreme Court.

David Sachs | Senior Copy Editor

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18 January 7 • 2016

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habad-Lubavitch of Michigan
will attempt to take its dispute
against the Bais Chabad Torah
Center of West Bloomfield to the U.S.
Supreme Court.
Back on April 17, 2012, Oak Park-
based Chabad of Michigan filed suit in
Oakland County Circuit Court seeking
the deed to the Torah Center synagogue
building to enforce what it said was a
binding decision of a beit din, a Jewish
ecclesiastical court.
Chabad of Michigan had sought to rein
in a “subordinate” congregation that it
said acted independently and challenged
the hierarchal authority it describes as the
essence of the Brooklyn-based Lubavitch
movement that dispatches emissaries
around the world to set up synagogues
and Chabad centers.
The Oakland County court, however,
dismissed the case summarily because it
said that Chabad of Michigan waited too
long to sue — in violation of the dead-
lines imposed by Michigan’s statutes of
limitations.
Chabad of Michigan, led by Rabbi
Berel Shemtov, then appealed and won
a reversal in the Michigan Court of
Appeals. That court ruled that the statutes
of limitations were suspended in defer-
ence to the dispute’s resolution in the beit
din.
But later, the Michigan Supreme Court
reversed that ruling and reinstated the
dismissal of the lawsuit, saying in a briefly
worded opinion that no grounds existed
to suspend the statutes of limitations.
Thus, Chabad’s only avenue to further
pursue its case is to ask the United States
Supreme Court to consider an appeal.
The high court, however, agrees to hear
only a limited number of cases per year.
On Nov. 24, 2015, Chabad of Michigan
told the U.S. Supreme Court that it will
request that the court hear its appeal.
The court granted an extension of time
until Feb. 5 for Chabad of Michigan to
file its formal petition. The attorney
signing Chabad of Michigan’s Supreme
Court paperwork was Nathan Lewin of
Washington, D.C.

Chabad of Michigan told the Supreme
Court that it will raise a freedom of reli-
gion issue based on the First Amendment
of the U.S. Constitution. That issue is
whether Michigan civil courts can use
statutes of limitations to prevent a court’s
enforcement of the decision of an ecclesi-
astical tribunal — even if the dispute was
handled in a timely manner pursuant to
the religious sect’s own rules.
Attorney Norman Ankers of Detroit-
based Honigman Miller Schwartz & Cohn
LLP, one of three law firms representing
Chabad of Michigan, said that the case
presents a “significant constitutional
issue” — whether an ecclesiastical tri-
bunal can do its work and not be con-
strained by the civil statutes of limita-
tions.
The Michigan Supreme Court did not
address this issue in its one-paragraph
ruling, Ankers said.
Rabbi Elimelech Silberberg of the
Torah Center, however, said the continu-
ing litigation is squandering “enormous
sums of money” on legal fees “despite
the fact that chances of the U.S. Supreme
Court hearing the case are remote.”
“This is all charity money, money that
should be spent on Jewish outreach, edu-
cation, programming, etc.,” he said.
In Silberberg’s view, the synagogue’s
board, which owns the building, was not
a party to the ruling of the beit din that
Chabad of Michigan seeks to enforce. He
has a letter from the Rabbinical Court
of the Central Committee of Chabad-
Lubavitch Rabbis in the United States and
Canada (which provided the original beit
din) stating it did not give permission for
the civil lawsuit because the Torah Center
board was not a party to the beit din case.
Attorney Todd Mendel of the Detroit-
based law firm Barris Sott Denn & Driker
PLLC is representing the Torah Center.
If the Supreme Court declines to
accept Chabad of Michigan’s appeal,
the case would be over. If it agrees to
hear the appeal, it would be assigned
to the Supreme Court term begin-
ning in October with a ruling coming
months later.

*

David Sachs

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