[A] New York rabbi who police said failed to pull over his vehicle for a trooper for more than 4 miles, leading to him and his son being taken out of his car at gunpoint, paid a $100 traffic ticket with the expectation that the criminal charge against him will be dismissed.
Robert Appel, the attorney representing Rabbi Berl Fink of Brooklyn, New York, said that his client paid the fine to the state judicial bureau, after pleading no contest to a ticket for failing to yield to an emergency vehicle.
Appel said the ticket was issued in lieu of the prosecutor continuing to pursue the criminal case. A status conference in the case had been set for Wednesday.
“We are awaiting the dismissal of the criminal charge before pursuing other potential remedies for the harm suffered by the rabbi and his family roadside on the night of August 8, 2017,” Appel said in a statement Wednesday.
The case garnered headlines across the state and in the New York City publications, including the tabloid, the New York Post.
State police identified Trooper Justin Thompson as the officer who conducted the stop.
The traffic stop occurred late at night on Interstate 91 in Fairlee. That’s when Rabbi Berl Fink, 57, driving a 2004 Toyota Camry, his wife, Sarah, and their two children, a son, 19, and a daughter, 16, were pulled over by Thompson.
The trooper said in an affidavit that he clocked Fink driving 83 mph in a 65-mph zone on the interstate. However, when he turned on his blue lights and followed the vehicle, it took four miles for Fink to pull over.
A dash cam video from the trooper’s cruiser showed him following Fink’s vehicle at speeds of about 60 mph.
According to Vermont State Police, because it was late at night, multiple people were in the car, and backup was not immediately on scene, Thompson conducted a “high-risk” traffic stop.
He ordered Fink and his son out of the vehicle at gunpoint. Sarah Fink called 911 from the passenger seat of the stopped vehicle and reported that the family was the victim of a “terror attack” by a police officer.
Fink later said once he realized the trooper was trying to pull him over, he tried to find a safe place and then stopped, according to court records.
The rabbi was handcuffed and said he was thrown to the ground by the trooper. The trooper can be seen on the video following the rabbi out of full view of the dash cam, and appears to use one hand to get him on the ground while holding his firearm in his other hand.
Fink was later charged with attempting to elude police and pleaded not guilty at a hearing in October in Orange County Superior Court. The trooper was cleared of any wrongdoing by state police following a review of the stop.
The family has said they were considering filing a lawsuit over the incident.
Orange County State’s Attorney William Porter could not immediately be reached Wednesday for comment.
