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A Wealthy Church in New York City Uses Church Property as Collateral in Financing Expensive Real Estate Deals

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Betsy Combier
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Without a Prayer For Relief: The NY State Supreme Court is Bought By Guide One Insurance Company and a Church, Madison Avenue Presbyterian


Since 1998, the Board of Trustees of Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church, Guide One Insurance Company, the City of New York, The Presbytery of NYC, The Presbyterian Church USA, and powerful members of New York's wealthy elite, have joined up with nine judges and 7 lawyers to extort money from estates, trusts, and innocent people who don’t – or cant – understand “The System” of theft and collusion that underlies every judge’s actions in the New York State Unified Court System. In November, 2005, Supreme Court Judge Lottie Wilkins and Guide One Insurance Company based in West Des Moines Iowa served me with an Injunction and Order of Prior Restraint to stop me from posting this story anywhere.

My mom died in March 1998 and left some valuable property to me, one of her twin daughters. Attorneys Kenneth Wasserman, Jonathan Landsman, Eli Uncyk; New York Supreme Court Judges Karla Moskowitz, Marilyn Shafer, Lottie Wilkins, and Jacqueline Silbermann, as well as NY Surrogate Court Judge Renee Roth, have all made a deal with Guide One Insurance Company based in West Des Moines, Iowa, and the Trustees of Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City, to steal this property and make sure that I never get it. Fortunately, I realized in 2001 what was going on, and have documented all the conversations and actions of this illustrious crew ever since. The picture that I want to paint is an ugly scene of court corruption, greed, violations of law and other illegal and corrupt practices that define the court system in New York.

A pro se litigant in New York has no chance of success in any matter, as the lawyers and judges - and in my case, my church and powerful real estate companies - talk and do their deals to harm anyone who dares to confront them behind closed doors, sometimes on a daily basis. Then they use the computer to put decisions into the record that have no basis in law or fact.

On October 8, 9, 10, 11 and 20, 2006, The New York Times published a series of articles by Diana Henriques (see below) that we believe show how powerful religious institutions have become in America.

The debate over where the line should be drawn separating church and state is no longer valid. It seems there is no line.

"The special breaks amount to 'a sort of religious affirmative action program',” said John Witte Jr, director of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at the Emory University law school.
Professor Witte added: “Separation of church and state was certainly part of American law when many of today’s public opinion makers were in school. But separation of church and state is no longer the law of the land.”

I believe that the documents we have show the illegal financing of real estate deals, as well as the scam of overpaying for repairs to the church building of Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City, secretly implemented by The Presbytery of NYC, The Presbyterian Church USA, Guide One Insurance Company, Attorney Kenneth T. Wasserman, Attorney Jonathan M. Landsman, The Law Firm of Michael E. Pressman, NY State Supreme Court Judge Marilyn Shafer, her fellow Judge in the Commercial Part Karla Moskowitz as well as her law clerk Eric Reiss, NYS Supreme Court Judge Lottie E. Wilkins, Gregory Moundas of Proskauer Rose, Supreme Court Judge Jaqueline Silbermann, Vornado Realty Trust VP Sandeep Mathrani, Sandy Davies, MAPC President of the Board of Trustees David C. Johnson, the Judges of the NY Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department, (who refuse to allow me to appeal this case), and have made Mr. Kenneth Wasserman a Respondent.


The City of New York seems to be the "owner" of Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church. Most of the congregation of "MAPC" does not know what is going on.

District Attorney Robert Morganthau, so far has expressed no interest in this RICO claim. Mr. Daniel Castleman, (212-335-9817) Chief of the Investigation Division, set up a meeting with his "best" investigator, Ms. Judy Weinstock, in January, 2006. Her response was, “We are not looking into this because you did not give us a receipt for the two toilets that were repaired in May, 2004 for $169,224."

I sent Mr. Castleman a letter and he never responded. Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's Charities Bureau told me they never investigate churches, because churches are not charities. Spitzer's criminal division's Mr. Bill Jorgenson told me in November, 2006, that the information I had showed "a clear-cut case of embezzlement", but only someone at the legislature level could submit it to the Attorney General for consideration, "sorry". He advised me not to call the Attorney General's office about this matter ever again and hung up.

My mom worked full-time as a volunteer for Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church ("MAPC") at 921 Madison Avenue 73rd street) in New York City. The church and the church building next door are located on prime real estate worth currently $21,000,000 (tax assessed value, NYC Dept. of Buildings, 2005). The church pays no taxes.

MAPC has an endowment valued at $20-30 million, depending on who you speak to. Every year approximately $2 million is raised in donations from the 920+ members. $25,000 is collected in cash from the plate passed around on sundays. No one outside of the Board of Trustees knows where this money is spent. As you will see below, in the 2004 budget (see p. 10) that I was given during the congregational meeting in January, 2005, there is a listing of a payment of $169,224 for the repair of two toilets for the nursery school. This amount seemed odd, so I and a colleague went to the New York City Department of Buildings and copied all the work permits for all the repairs made to the church building from 1999-2005. We found the invoice for the two toilets, which were repaired by Prudon & Partners for $90,000. Well, if the congregation was spending $169,224 on a toilet, and the company that did the work was paid only $90,000, where did the missing almost $80,000 go? Prudon misspelled the name of the Day School, as well.

Vornado Realty Trust is the landlord of Bloomberg LLP, and is connected to the construction Company Taylor Ball, whose subsidiary, Ladco Development Inc., is located in West Des Moines Iowa, home to Guide One Insurance Company.

I tried to find out where the missing $80,000, from the single repair work permit to fix the two toilets, was. I called the accountant who did the budget, Sandy Davies of O'Connor Davies, and was told that Mr. Davies never saw any receipts for any job. Then I called the Presbytery of New York City, and spoke with the financial officer, Simon Lai, who is supposed to look at money donated to and spent by presbyterian churches in New York City. He told me that he has never seen any financial information from MAPC in the 7 years he has worked at the Presbytery. As MAPC uses the tax exempt IRS number for the Presbyterian Church, USA General Assembly, I called over there to find out if any records of MAPC were available. There are none. Thus, MAPC is an entity doing business in New York City without any oversight by anyone.

Then, while surfing the internet and in particular ACRIS, I found a UCC financing agreement of a co-op belonging to Vornado Realty Trust Executive VP Sandeep Mathrani and his wife, Aiysha which used the church property, (Block 1388, Lot 21), even though Mr. Mathrani and his wife are not members of MAPC (the social security numbers of both Sandeep and his wife were deleted by me before posting the UCC agreement). I called Mr. Mathrani's office, and asked his secretary if I could ask him why he financed his coop using the property of MAPC. She told me that he had never heard of Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church, and hung up. I called back, and asked why he would say that, considering the fact that the Mathrani home is across the street from the Church. Sandeep's secretary asked me to send him all my documents.

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Betsy is an award-winning writer, video producer, and journalist. She is President of The E-Accountability Foundation, a non-profit company which does business as ParentAdvocates.org and asks questions of politicians, corporate leaders, and (more...)
 
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A Wealthy Church in New York City Uses Church Property as Collateral in Financing Expensive Real Estate Deals

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