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Judah Karkowsky, age 44, received a one-year sentence on Thursday, June 20, months after a jury found him guilty of criminal contempt and more, the Nassau County District Attorney (NCDA) announced.
Karkowsky, who is a former Commissioner of the Woodmere Fire District and a volunteer EMT in the Woodmere Fire Department, was arrested in September 2021 for two misdemeanors, one of which included a sex abuse charge.
He was suspended from the fire department shortly after his arrest, the DA’s Office said.
However, Karkowsky’s case was dismissed in May 2022 on procedural grounds after the party against Karkowsky failed to be ready for trial within 90 days of his arraignment.
The DA’s Office said that Karkowsky requested a copy of the court transcript (in which the judge explained the procedural grounds for the dismissal), which he sent a picture of to the co-chairman of the board of trustees at his synagogue.
The picture Karkowsky sent included a sentence that was not in the actual transcript. It implied he was innocent and read, “Notwithstanding, this court has believed for some time that the People’s case lacked substance and should not have reached this point.”
He was not granted full access to the synagogue, though he was reinstated to the Woodmere Fire Department after his trial was dismissed.
Karkowsky then served two Notice of Claims, one on Woodmere Fire District and Fire Department and another on Nassau County, each seeking $15 million in compensation.
In one, he claimed that members of the fire department caused him to be falsely arrested; in the other, he claimed that members of the Nassau County Police Department and the NCDA willfully ignored exculpatory evidence.
In both cases, he used the falsified statements to make his case.
He was arrested again in November 2022.
“Shunned from the Synagogue where he worshiped after a sex abuse charge was levied against him, this defendant falsified court paperwork that he presented to a member of his Synagogue’s leadership to get back into their good graces,” said District Attorney Anne T. Donnelly.
“[He] later doubled down on this deceit by using the language he concocted to file multi-million-dollar lawsuits against Nassau County and the Woodmere Fire District and Department claiming he was falsely arrested and prosecuted.”
“This defendant’s actions were a flagrant attack on the integrity of the criminal justice system – something this office will not stand for.”
At his trial, audio evidence and testimony by the judge and court reporter for Karkowsky’s original case showed that the added transcript sentence had never been said.
On April 14, 2024, Kawkowsky was found guilty of the following:
- Criminal possession of a forged instrument;
- Offering a false instrument for filing, three counts;
- Making an apparently sworn false statement, two counts; and
- Criminal contempt, two counts.
He was charged with one year for each felony count to run concurrently.
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