Menachem Youlus: Jewish Indiana Jones admits to Torah Fraud

A Jewish charity co-founder who claimed he traveled the world as a "Jewish Indiana Jones" to rescue Torahs pleaded guilty to fraud: Menachem Youlus said he lied when he claimed he had personally obtained vintage Torah scrolls in Europe and Israel for six years. Youlus, the owner of the Jewish Bookstore in Maryland, entered the plea to mail and wire fraud charges in US District Court in Manhattan, entered the plea to mail and wire fraud charges in US District Court in Manhattan. A plea deal with prosecutors called foe him to serve up to five years and three months in prison. "I know what I did was wrong, and I deeply regret my conduct," Youlus, 50, said as he described the lies he told between 2004 and 2010 to obtain funds from his Save a Torah charity and some of its contributors. Prosecutors said he defrauded the charity he founded and its donors out of $862,000. The government said he fabricated detailed accounts of exploits to recover Torahs lost or hidden during the Holocaust, including at the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland and the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany. During his plea, he said his lies included telling prospective buyers that he had personally retrieved parts of one scroll from a metal box at Auschwitz. Sentencing was set for June 21. A criminal complaint said Youlus had distributed Torahs he bought from US dealers to synagogues and congregations nationwide, sometimes at inflated rates.