An online petition in support of jailed kosher meat executive Sholom Rubashkin has garnered 10 times its organizers’ goal of 5,000 signatures.
The petition, which calls on President Barack Obama to order an investigation into judicial misconduct in Rubashkin’s financial fraud trial, had 51,605 signatures.
Created Sept. 22 by the Justice for Sholom organization, the petition was posted on We the People, a White House Web page launched to encourage public participation in government. Its goal was 5,000 signatures by Oct. 22.
On Sept. 26, an appeals court in
St. Louis turned down a motion for a new trial for the former executive of Agriprocessors, once the nation’s largest kosher meat plant. The court ruled that the presiding judge in the original case, Linda Reade of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Iowa, did not have to recuse herself because she was involved in planning the May 2008 federal immigration raid on the Agriprocessors plant, which led to the company’s bankruptcy later that year.
Rubashkin was convicted of financial fraud in 2009 and sentenced to 27 years in prison, two more years than requested by prosecutors. He is serving his sentence in New York State. — jta