Hayim Cohen gained notoriety on YouTube and TikTok as a rabbi who took in children and cared for them. As time went on, the 40-year-old Texas man told his followers that he suffered from an illness and was in hospice.

But it turned out that, apparently, Cohen was neither terminally ill nor a rabbi — and he was sexually abusing his adopted sons.

On Monday, a Houston judge sentenced Cohen to 40 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to four counts of continuous sexual assault of a child and one count of indecency with a child.

“You realize you are never going to get out of prison, you’re going to die in prison?” Judge Lanilo Lacayo asked Cohen.

The defendant continued to feign illness during the sentencing hearing, not answering Lacayo when he asked him his age.

“I know you understand everything I’ve said to you from the beginning to the end,” Lacayo said, according to local CBS affiliate KHOU. “You ran an interesting con, sir. You violated all these boys and you’re here today facing justice.”

Houston police detectives began investigating when one of the victims called into an Atlanta-based podcast on a burner phone and detailed the abuse. The podcaster contacted authorities.

Police arrested Cohen in February 2023 on allegations that he had abused six of his nine adopted sons. When they went to his house they were met with a hospice care provider purportedly looking after Cohen. However, when detectives took him to two hospitals, doctors could find nothing medically wrong with him.

More from Law&Crime: ‘I thought my child was safe’: School janitor who rubbed private parts on cafeteria utensils, sprayed bleach on cucumbers learns fate

Being in jail has apparently not stopped Cohen from continuing to fake his sickness. In a hearing about a month after his arrest, he showed up in a wheelchair and a urine drainage bag. On Monday, he appeared in court with a shaved head and face, looking like he had lost a significant amount of weight. He was still in a wheelchair.

Prosecutors still believe he is mostly faking his illness.

A 38-year-old man in New York City has been arrested after he allegedly performed an illegal plastic surgery procedure inside his home on a 31-year-old woman who was left brain-dead. Felipe Hoyos-Foronda was taken into custody at John F. Kennedy International Airport on Friday and charged with one count of second-degree assault and one count of unauthorized practice of a profession.

According to a criminal complaint obtained by The Independent, the victim went to Hoyos-Foronda’s home in Queens on the evening of March 28, 2025, because she wanted to have her butt implants removed. Shortly after she arrived at the residence, which reportedly doubled as a makeshift medical office, authorities say that Hoyos-Foronda administered several lidocaine injections.

Unfortunately, the injections soon caused the victim to go into cardiac arrest, police said. Hoyos-Foronda reportedly called Emergency Medical Services to his home before fleeing the scene in his car.

Upon arriving at the scene, first responders entered the home where they found the victim unresponsive. She was transported to Astoria General Hospital for treatment, where doctors believed she suffered lidocaine toxicity due to excessive amounts of the drug being in her system, The New York Daily News reported. The condition typically causes seizures and an irregular heartbeat, but in extreme cases leads to cardiac arrest.

The building’s landlord reportedly provided authorities with information on Hoyos-Foronda and his photograph.

A Kansas man was arrested this week for allegedly posing as an employee for Walmart — telling a female shopper he was an “asset protection officer” and that she needed to come with him to the back of the store — where he attacked and raped her, cops say.

Justin Metz, 42, singled out the woman at a Walmart in Atchison on U.S. Route 73 earlier this month and kidnapped her under the guise of a security guard, according to the local Hays Post news website and Fox affiliates KCTV and WDAF.

Metz allegedly approached the 32-year-old shopper as she was leaving the store and told her he was an “asset protection officer” who needed to speak with her, the Atchison Police Department reports.

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Technology

No. 42 law firm by head count could face sanctions over fake case citations generated by AI

By Debra Cassens Weiss

February 10, 2025, 10:30 am CST

Updated: Lawyers from plaintiffs law firm Morgan & Morgan are facing possible sanctions for a motion that cited eight nonexistent cases, at least some of which were apparently generated by artificial intelligence.

In a Feb. 6 order, U.S. District Judge Kelly H. Rankin of the District of Wyoming told lawyers from Morgan & Morgan and the Goody Law Group to provide copies of the cited cases, and if they can’t, to show cause why they shouldn’t be sanctioned.

Law360 and Original Jurisdiction have coverage.

The cases cited by the court had been “hallucinated” by an internal AI platform and were not legitimate, the firms said in a Feb. 10 response to the show-cause order.

“This matter comes with great embarrassment and has prompted discussion and action regarding the training, implementation and future use of artificial intelligence within our firm,” the response said. “This serves as a cautionary tale for our firm and all firms, as we enter this new age of artificial intelligence.”

The law firms’ brief had cited nine cases, but Rankin could locate only one of them. Some of the citations did lead to cases under different names.

The lawyers’ motion also included a description of the governing legal standard that was “peculiar,” Rankin said. The motion correctly cited a federal rule of evidence but then went on to say “Wyoming caselaw reinforces these principles.” To support the assertion about Wyoming caselaw, the motion cited fake federal district court cases.

“Notwithstanding this slight inconsistency, experienced litigators like plaintiffs’ counsel should know that this court is a federal court, and therefore federal procedural law governs evidentiary issues,” Rankin wrote.

Morgan & Morgan is ranked No. 42 in the United States based on firm head count, according to Original Jurisdiction, which cited figures from the American Lawyer. The Goody Law Group appears to be a small firm based in California.

“Moral of the story: Lawyers at large firms can misuse ChatGPT as well as anyone,” wrote Above the Law founder David Lat at Original Jurisdiction.

The case involves a hoverboard sold by Walmart that allegedly exploded and caught fire, according to Law360.

The lawyers who signed the now-withdrawn motion with the alleged fake cites were Rudwin Ayala and T. Michael Morgan of Morgan & Morgan and Taly Goody of the Goody Law Group.

They did not immediately respond to ABA Journal emails seeking comment. Morgan and Goody did not respond to Journal voicemails. A person who answered a call at Morgan & Morgan could not locate Ayala in the directory.

The communications director for Morgan & Morgan emailed the Journal a copy of the show-cause response after it was filed.

Updated Feb. 12 at 8:50 a.m. to report on the response to the show-cause order.

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3. Judge resigns for second time after he’s…

Judiciary

Judge resigns for second time after he’s accused of staging fake proceeding

By Debra Cassens Weiss

February 6, 2025, 11:23 am CST

A New York judge has resigned for a second time for allegedly staging a sham proceeding, but this time, he won’t be returning to the bench.

Judge Louis P. Violanti of the Lackawanna City Court in Erie County, New York, resigned Jan. 23 and agreed never to return, according to a Feb. 5 press release and documents noted by the Legal Profession Blog.

Violanti first resigned in March 2013 but made no promises that he wouldn’t return, according to the press release, a Jan. 2 stipulation and an August 2024 ethics complaint. He resigned the first time after learning that he was under investigation for allegedly staging a sham proceeding in January 2013 to dismiss a traffic charge for an acquaintance.

No prosecutor was present for the proceeding, and a police officer posed as the traffic defendant, according to the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct.

“Following the sham proceeding, and on the basis of fictitious evidence,” Violanti dismissed the charge, the ethics complaint said. The acquaintance had been accused of driving with a suspended vehicle registration.

The sham-proceedings allegation led to a two-year suspension of Violanti’s law license. The suspension decision by the Appellate Division’s Fourth Judicial Department of the New York Supreme Court said mitigating factors included Violanti’s “longtime and substantial community involvement,” his sincere expression of remorse, and his advice that all parties cooperate in the ethics investigation.

Violanti was reinstated to practice in March 2016. The mayor of Lackawanna, New York, appointed Violanti to a six-year term on the city court in March 2024. Five months later, the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct filed a new ethics complaint based on the same 2013 proceeding.

Robert H. Tembeckjian, the commission’s administrator, said in the press release Violanti “would have been removed in 2013,” making him “constitutionally ineligible to return” to the bench if the commission had not been constrained by time limits in the law.

“A decade later, he came back” to the bench, Tembeckjian said, “only to face discipline and agree to the inevitable: permanent departure from the bench.”

Violanti commented in a statement forwarded to the ABA Journal by his lawyer, Rodney O. Personius of Personius Melber.

“While now over a dozen years old” Violanti said of the proceeding, “I once again acknowledge my poor exercise of judgment in resolving a traffic citation for a close friend that arose from a mistake made by his auto insurance carrier. The disposition of the citation was not the issue, as recognized by the district attorney at the time.

“Whether I required the defendant to come to court or not, the underlying charge was subject to dismissal due to the insurance company’s error. At the time, I took full responsibility for my improper handling of this matter, which included voluntarily resigning from my judicial post and accepting without opposition the two-year sanction imposed by the appellate division.

“I understood the matter ended at that point, and therefore accepted the reappointment to the bench that was offered to me almost 12 months ago. I have since served the Lackawanna community honorably and competently as its associate judge. When this old matter resurfaced and my timeliness objection was denied, I decided the public, particularly our community, would be best served if I simply stepped aside. I am forever grateful for having had this additional opportunity, however brief, to again contribute to the good of our city.”

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Ethics

Prosecutor ‘poisoned the morale’ of DA’s office with fake harassment texts, disbarment order says

By Debra Cassens Weiss

January 10, 2025, 9:32 am CST

A former prosecutor in Colorado should be disbarred for faking four texts that she attributed to a co-worker, including one referring to her as a “sex doll,” according to a Dec. 31 hearing board opinion.

Yujin Choi of Denver fabricated the texts in October 2022 to make it appear that the co-worker was harassing her and then “doubled down on that deceit” by intentionally altering evidence, according to the hearing board, which is part of the Colorado Supreme Court’s Office of the Presiding Disciplinary Judge.

Choi allegedly doctored cellphone records and repeatedly deleted the texts. She claimed that her cellphone stopped working when she accidentally dropped it in the bathtub and asserted that her laptop also broke when she accidentally spilled water on it.

“In our view, this narrative is not plausible,” the opinion said.

Choi “pursued a personal vendetta” against the co-worker, criminal investigator Dan Hines, “by launching an informal smear campaign” for reasons “that remain opaque to us,” the hearing board said.

The New York Times, Law360, the Denver Post and Ars Technica (via the Legal Profession Blog) have coverage.

Choi, who was admitted to practice in May 2019, can appeal the decision. She was a deputy district attorney in the Denver district attorney’s family violence unit before she was fired for the alleged misconduct.

Choi sent the four texts to herself, changing the name in her cellphone to make it appear the co-worker was the sender, the hearing board concluded. It was the second time that she had accused Hines.

The first time, in 2021, Choi claimed that Hines had made an inappropriate remark in June 2021, and that he later sent a text that she considered to be harassing. An investigation was closed as unsubstantiated. Hines was nonetheless transferred within the office and told to avoid contact with Choi.

The texts at issue in the ethics opinion surfaced in October 2022. Choi was at a bar with friends when she showed them a text. It read: “Yujin, please stop talking about what I didn’t do to our colleagues. You are using your looks against innocent people. If you want to act like a sex doll to get a sugar daddy … fine, but that will not be me.”

Choi claimed that there were three more texts, all from Hines. They read, “Don’t be stupid,” “Let’s talk,” and “I’m sorry, hope you have a nice weekend.”

By disseminating the texts to co-workers and supervisors, Choi “perpetrated a false and harmful narrative that Hines had sexually harassed her by sending her these messages,” the opinion said.

Choi said she didn’t want the matter investigated, but her supervisors felt a duty to do so and required cooperation. When Hines was confronted with the texts, he logged in to his Verizon account to provide cellphone records and offered his iPhone for investigation. There was no indication that Hines sent the texts, the hearing board said.

Official records obtained directly from Verizon indicated that Choi sent and received the fourth text message in the Hines text thread at the time that she claimed to have received it, leading the hearing board to conclude that she also sent the first three messages. The first text displayed a time stamp indicating that it was sent more than 40 minutes after Choi texted a supervisor about it.

The damage included harm to Hines’ reputation and betrayal of co-workers who advocated for her during the investigation, the decision said.

Choi “poisoned the morale of the DA’s office, contributing to an environment in which victims feared they might be disbelieved and others feared they might be wrongly accused,” the hearing board said. “Further, her actions called into question whether the evidence in the criminal cases she prosecuted was genuine,” tarnished the reputation of prosecutors, and potentially undermined the credibility of sexual harassment victims.

A counselor had diagnosed Choi with post-traumatic stress disorder and vicarious trauma caused by Choi’s emotionally taxing work in the family violence unit. Her lawyers did not immediately respond to ABA Journal emails seeking comment.

Hines told the Denver Post that he “wouldn’t wish this upon anybody,” and he was “living in hell” after Choi’s first accusation. He has sued the Denver district attorney over the handling of the investigation.

The district attorney’s office later determined that Choi’s casework was in “excellent order” with no evidence of fabrication, a spokesperson told the New York Times. The office also thinks that the investigation was properly handled, the spokesperson said.

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3. Judge suspended without pay after indictment…

Judiciary

Judge suspended without pay after indictment for alleged fake layoffs

By Debra Cassens Weiss

October 15, 2024, 9:10 am CDT

A common pleas judge in York County, Pennsylvania, has been suspended without pay following his indictment for allegedly urging four law firm employees to collect unemployment benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic while continuing to work from home.

The Pennsylvania Court of Judicial Discipline suspended 61-year-old Judge Steven Stambaugh of Pennsylvania from the bench Oct. 9, report Law360 and the York Dispatch.

The Judicial Conduct Board of Pennsylvania sought Stambaugh’s suspension earlier that day, citing a 31-count indictment alleging mail and wire fraud, witness tampering and obstruction of justice, according to an Oct. 9 press release that included the petition and indictment. The U.S. Department of Justice summarized the allegations in an Oct. 8 press release.

Stambaugh began service as a judge in January 2022.

The Oct. 8 indictment, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, says beginning in March 2020, Stambaugh urged his employees to collect unemployment benefits. He allegedly promised to make up the difference between the benefits and their usual pay. The benefit payment was expanded during the pandemic.

The employees were instructed to falsely say they had been laid off in March 2020 and later to file false certifications that they did not work during preceding weeks, the indictment says.

Stambaugh’s alleged aim was to “unjustly enrich himself by using government funds to pay the employees of Stambaugh Law,” according to the indictment.

Stambaugh is also accused of omitting information about the ostensible layoffs in applications for government loans and loan forgiveness during the pandemic.

The indictment also alleges that Stambaugh tried to persuade an employee to state that any work that he performed for the firm was voluntary, if he was questioned by federal investigators. He also asked the employee to meet with him in advance of grand jury testimony to ensure that they were “on the same page,” according to the indictment. Those actions allegedly happened from April 2021 through November 2022.

Jerry Russo, Stambaugh’s lawyer, told the York Dispatch after the indictment that he and his client were evaluating the charges.

“We’re doing our own investigation of the facts,” Russo said.

Stambaugh did not immediately respond to a request for comment submitted through his firm website. Russo did not immediately comment when the ABA Journal reached him by phone.

A now-former Indiana sheriff’s deputy was recently arrested after pretending to be a woman on Facebook in order to harass a schoolteacher he once dated, law enforcement in the Hoosier State says.

Derek Joseph Bogenschutz, 36, stands accused of one count of felony identity deception, according to the Indiana State Police.

The defendant previously worked as a deputy with the Jay County Sheriff’s Office — and also as a part-time resource officer at the elementary school where the woman taught.

It is unclear when, exactly, Bogenschutz stopped working for the sheriff’s office.