Pro-Rubashkin newspaper ad hasn’t run in Sioux Falls

According to a spokeswoman in the advertising department of The Sioux Falls Argus-Leader, the newspaper has not run or yet been requested to run any ad copy paid for by “Friends of Sholom Rubashkin.”

Rubashkin, the former day-to-day executive at the Agriprocessors meatpacking plant in Postville, recently had his federal trial moved from Iowa to Sioux Falls, S.D. in an effort to mitigate jury tainting due to excessive media coverage. He faces a host of immigration-related and fraud charges that stem from a May 2008 immigration raid at the Agriprocessors plant. On Thursday, a half-page advertisement ran on page 5 of The Des Moines Register that was paid for by “Friends of Sholom Rubashkin” using a Brooklyn, N.Y., address. It was a move which caught the ire of federal prosecutors as well as the judge who agreed to move the trial from Iowa to South Dakota to mitigate pre-trial publicity.

A half-page ad that ran Thursday in The Des Moines Register, linked to members of the Rubashkin family, has not appeared in Sioux Falls media where the trial of Sholom Rubashkin is scheduled to begin this month.

Chief Judge Linda R. Reade, according to The Gazette, said that if such an advertisement ran in the similarly Gannett-owned Sioux Falls newspaper, that she was “going to hit the roof.”

Guy Cook, defense attorney for Rubashkin, told the court that he was not aware of the advertisement and that it didn’t stem from the council of rabbis who are providing defense funding for his client. The address used in the advertisement, however, is also used by Rite Surgical Supplies, a company that has ties to the Rubashkin family. Levi Balkany, a grandson of Agriprocessors founder A. Aaron Rubashkin and nephew of Sholom M. Rubashkin, listed himself as vice president of Rite Surgical Supplies on forms required by the Federal Elections Commission by those who make political contributions.

Levi Balkany is the son of one of Aaron Rubashkin’s daughters and Milton Balkany, a Rabbi who was charged in 2003 with misappropriation of nearly $1 million in federal grant money intended for disabled students at a Jewish school. After Milton Balkany apologized and made restitution, he did not face prosecution. Milton Balkany has also been referred to as the “Brooklyn bundler” for his ability to gather and bundle numerous campaign donations (many from Rubashkin family members) for primarily Republican candidates, in exchange for consideration of issues important for Orthodox Jewish institutions. Part of the federal deal for deferring prosecution on the grant money was that Balkany would be barred from lobbying the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, although federal prosecutors declined to elaborate on why this particular activity was of importance.

Levi Balkany is one of 16 individuals, members of the Chabad Jewish Community in Brooklyn, that were named in December 2008 to “The Committee of Concerned Anash for Pidyon Shevuyim,” a group organized to create a top-notch legal team for Sholom Rubashkin and to mount a donation and public relations campaign on his behalf.

In a press release the committee said that they want “the public to know they are the official group to assist and aid the Rubashkins, endorsed by the family” and that they have “years of experience in dealing with pidyon shevuyim (prisoner of war) cases.”

Although the committee’s efforts have been prominent in Jewish circles, the half-page ad in Iowa is one of the few times the group has sought to sway overall public sentiment regarding the case. Weekday reach of The Des Moines Register into the Sioux Falls area is roughly 3,500 households, according to a company spokesperson.

Judge Reade, citing media accounts that prohibited seating an impartial jury in the case, decided in August to move the upcoming trial from Iowa to South Dakota. At that time, the court warned prosecutors and defense attorneys about tainting the Sioux Falls media prior to the start of the trial, which is scheduled for Oct. 10.

Defense attorneys during a pretrial hearing in Cedar Rapids on Thursday argued that prosecutors had already dismissed the court’s warning by sending out press releases announcing the guilty plea of Mitchel Meltzer, a former chief financial officer at the plant, to numerous press outlets, including those in Sioux Falls. Despite the press releases not being targeted to that specific media market, Judge Reade nonetheless admonished the prosecuting team.

Reporters covering the case in Sioux Falls, according to Reade, will not be allowed any access to immediate story filing through blogs or social networking sites like twitter. Laptops and cellphones will be barred.