Let's Talk About South Blooming Grove's Gang of Dirt Bike-Riding Nazis
Did a gang of white supremacist hooligans deface construction vehicles on the Clovewood property? Or was it a publicity stunt conducted by Mr. Joel Stern's United Jewish Community of Blooming Grove?
Pictured Above: Have you seen this man? The New York State Police are looking to identify him and his pals who are suspects in a bias-related incident / Criminal Mischief investigation. The above image has been upscaled using Artificial Intelligence to make it clearer.
So, is South Blooming Grove suddenly overrun by dirt bike-riding Nazis?
Or was there yet another publicity stunt, organized by the local hate group, to drum up support for a police force Mr. Joel Stern can control?
Today, we're going to look at the facts.
On Thursday, June 20th, 2024, the Village of South Blooming Grove—via its official Facebook page—announced its authorization to hire a special counsel (Nora Murphy) to investigate creating a public safety department.
The Village, to date, has declined to provide any information concerning Mrs. Murphy, how much they're paying her while also paying Village Attorney Scott Ugell, and what role, if any, she plays in managing the affairs of the Village.
Mr. Ugell has not been seen at the Village meeting for over a month. His absence coincides with questions submitted by The Monroe Gazette about whether or not Mr. Ugell hired someone to threaten to murder a former business partner of his.
Mrs. Murphy made her first public appearance on behalf of the Village during April's call with the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC). She advocated for the DEC to approve Keen Equities LLC's permit applications there.
During this call, Mrs. Murphy did not disclose that Mr. Joel Stern, one of two de facto mayors in South Blooming Grove, is an employee of Jacob Gold, the second largest shareholder in Keen Equities LLC, the project she was advocating for.
She also did not disclose that Mr. Y.C. Rubin, who works on behalf of Keen Equities LLC, is employed by the same company — Windsor Global — as Mr. Joel Stern and Mr. Jacob Gold.
This is important to remember because Keen Equities LLC would have access to security camera footage captured on the Clovewood development site. That means Mr. Joel Stern would also have access to that same security footage and know where the cameras are blind.
The June 20th, 2024, announcement on Facebook also followed Joel Stern, accusing the Town of Blooming Grove police department of being understaffed and under-resourced.
He said this at the Village Board of Trustees meeting on Friday, June 14th, 2024.
Since that meeting, SBG Mayor George Kalaj has insisted, hilariously, that he is in charge of making the decisions in the Village, not Mr. Stern. Mr. Kalaj has yet to provide any example of where he vetoed or otherwise encouraged the Village Board of Trustees to vote down a suggestion made by Mr. Joel Stern. You can see Mayor Kalaj say that at 34:00 into the June 24th, 2024 meeting here. (Video courtesy of Preserve Blooming Grove.)
Also, since that meeting, the Village has gone to great lengths to remind everyone that they are not creating a new police department but a public safety division.
Mr. Stern has a lengthy and verifiable history in South Blooming Grove of making false public statements at meetings; some of the more recent ones concern the State Department of Transportation, the State Department of Environmental Conservation, and the South Blooming Grove Independence Fire Company. He has also lied to the police on at least two identifiable occasions during their investigations into his behavior.
Mr. Stern also has a lengthy history of encounters with the Town of Blooming Grove Police Department. Town police have responded to calls accusing Mr. Stern of Trespassing, destruction of property, and larceny. This is according to FOIL-ed police reports obtained by The Monroe Gazette detailing Mr. Stern’s behavior throughout the Spring of 2023 at the Rapid Care facility he may or may not own. (The ownership of the business was in dispute, and the resolution to that dispute is not publicly known since it was settled in a rabbinical court.)
In addition to his numerous encounters with the Town of Blooming Grove Police Department, Mr. Stern has been accused in court of defrauding at least two different businesses, one in Orange County and another in Westchester County.
For those unaware, Mr. Stern is the founder of the United Jewish Community of Blooming Grove. Using the definition of the Southern Poverty Law Center and the FBI, this group qualifies as a hate group.
This UJC (not to be confused with the Woodbury UJC) has also been accused of pulling a public relations stunt to bolster its claim of antisemitism in the South Blooming Grove community.
This stunt, reported to have happened in August of 2023, included placing a sign outside a South Blooming Grove home that said, "No Jew, Get Out." The sign immediately vanished after photos were taken and distributed by Mr. Stern's UJC organization.
The property owner whose home the sign appeared in front of has declined to comment after multiple attempts by The Monroe Gazette to reach her. When News 12 went to investigate the alleged sign, it was long gone, meaning that whoever took the pictures for the UJC may have also removed the sign after doing so.
On Monday, June 17th, 2024, Town of Blooming Grove Police Chief Wakeham disputed Mr. Sterns's accusations about his police department in a statement provided to The Monroe Gazette.
On Saturday, June 22nd, 2024, two days after the Village posted on Facebook announcing the public safety department, four suspects on dirt bikes entered the highly secured Clovewood property at or around 7 p.m.
How secure is highly secured? One reader who attempted to enter the property was stopped by security. Later that evening, they received phone calls telling them never to try that again, implying that the video cameras that dot the property may also be using facial recognition technology. (Another point to remember, given that the suspects seen entering the Clovewood property were all masked, as you can see in the photos above provided by State Police.)
Sources from the State Police told The Monroe Gazette that a swastika was spray painted on at least one construction vehicle at the Clovewood property.
In an official statement from the State Police, Officer Nevel told The Monroe Gazette:
'The incident is under investigation. The state police will not discuss the process of the investigation. Any time [sic] of hate crime is of great concern to the state police. Our troopers and investigators diligently seek out who did this egregious crime."
As you know, the Clovewood development is (supposedly) not operational due to a stop work order issued by New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation.
I say supposedly because at least one lawsuit, Guilmar Montufar v. Keen Equities LLC, details that work has continued at the site despite the stop-work orders. Mr. Montufar was critically injured in a construction-related accident on the Clovewood property when a stop work order was said to be in place.
Concerning the June 22nd, 2024 incident, any person with information about the identity of the suspect(s) is asked to contact the State Police Monroe barracks at Orrelyn.Campbell@troopers.ny.gov or (845) 782-7574. If you contact the troopers, refer to case #24*363048.
So, What's Going On Here?
Let's be clear before we get any further into this: If you're the kind of person dumb enough to spray paint swastikas on stuff, whether it is a publicity stunt or not, you should be hit in the face with a shovel.
I don't have the patience for any antisemitic bullshit. Hopefully, people reading The Monroe Gazette feel the same way. Antisemitism in any form should be condemned vehemently. Publicity stunt or no publicity stunt.
(If it IS a publicity stunt, then Mr. Stern and his organization owe the Jewish Community of Southern Orange County an explanation and an apology.)
I hope the suspect(s), after a thorough police investigation, face consequences for their actions if found guilty. I also hope that, if it's true that Mr. Stern put someone up to do this, he also faces potential legal consequences.
If one thing is evident from the above facts, it's that Mr. Joel Stern will do whatever it takes to get what he wants.
So, there are at least two distinct possibilities we need to discuss:
The first is that this is just random crazy happenstance.
School's out.
Saturday, June 22nd, 2024, at 7 p.m. (when the crime is said to have occurred) was Sunny and beautiful outside in South Blooming Grove.
There's a lot of parkland surrounding the Clovewood property.
So, who's to say a couple of idiots didn't get on their dirt bikes, found an easy way onto a controversial housing property, and decided to stick it to "The Jews."
It's entirely possible. We cannot rule this out.
This is mainly because the dirt bike in question is a Honda Cr85, which has not been manufactured since 2007 and is usually reserved for a young, high school-age rider.
At least from the pictures provided by the police, it looks like a kid on a bike.
If this is indeed what happened, it is not great news for the community.
First, because antisemitism in any form is reprehensible.
Second, behavior like this actively harms the warranted legal, ethical, and moral resistance to Mr. Joel Stern and Isaac Ekstein's actions.
Because NOW, both men can point to this incident and say, "See? I told you we are surrounded by antisemites. I told you the Blooming Grove police can't protect us. That's why we need our own police force."
These stupid, sophomoric actions hand this criminal duo (Stern and Ekstein) a big fat win.
If South Blooming Grove has even the most remote chance of fighting against a hostile takeover by a wealthy developer (Rebbe Aaron Teitelbaum or Mr. Avrum ber Jakobwitz) stuff like this absolutely cannot happen.
That brings us to the second possibility …
As mentioned, Mr. Stern would have access to all footage captured on the Clovewood property. He would also know where the cameras have blind spots.
(There was a report on Tuesday following the incident of a white construction vehicle removing a section of fence on the Clovewood property. A section wide enough for someone on a dirt bike to come through. How long that section of fence was in disrepair or otherwise not functional is unknown at this time.)
So, the second possibility is that Mr. Stern or an associate hired someone to get on a dirt bike, intentionally vandalized construction equipment, and then called to report the crime.
I have FOIL-ed the State and Town police for the actual calls regarding who reported this incident.
Given that nobody is supposed to be working on the site, there's a question of how the swastika was even discovered.
There are also other legitimate questions to be asked here.
This incident happened eleven days after Mr. Stern's call for a public safety division and two days after the Village Facebook post about the public safety division.
Given that Mr. Stern is clearly someone who will do whatever it takes to get whatever he wants in South Blooming Grove — including breaking the law — it is not outrageous to question whether or not this was a stunt to bolster his efforts to get that pseudo police force given the timing of this incident.
As a Jew, it is profoundly disheartening and frightening even to have to consider this possibility, but we must consider it and investigate.
We'll have more details to share about this case as soon as possible.
Again, any person with information about the identity of the suspect(s) is asked to contact the State Police Monroe barracks at Orrelyn.Campbell@troopers.ny.gov or (845) 782-7574. If you contact the troopers, refer to case #24*363048.
I have also begun my own investigation, starting with the dirt bikes. Given that the Honda Cr85 requires a lot of maintenance work—to say nothing of the noise they make—someone who has worked on those bikes in our area may know who these riders are. So, I’m already asking around to find out who in the area helps to maintain these bikes when they need repairs.