Orthodox Jewish group in Brooklyn donates $47,000 to family of slain Jersey City officer

JERSEY CITY — An Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn, touched by the heroism of Jersey City Detective Joseph Seals on the day of the deadly kosher market attack, on Tuesday donated $47,000 to his widow and children.

The check was given to his family at an event at City Hall in Jersey City, where Carmine Disbrow, president of the Jersey City Policemen's Benevolent Association, accepted on behalf of the Seals family.

The fundraising was led by leaders of the Orthodox Jewish community based in Brooklyn's Flatbush section, including Chaskel Bennett, Leon Goldenberg and Moshe Wulliger.

Bennett, co-founder of the Flatbush Jewish Community Coalition, said before the event that the donations came from people not just in New Jersey and New York, but as far away as Israel.

"The check, and what the check represents, means more to me than anything else," Bennett said. "People came together in grief and in horror, and responded in a way that is deeply emotional and really the best of humanity in the worst of moments."

Bennett and several members of Brooklyn's Orthodox Jewish community, along with members of Jersey City's Orthodox Jewish community, were on hand to present the check.

Bennett said Seals' death in Jersey City affected him and others in the Jewish community outside the city so deeply that it prompted the fundraising.

"When we in the broader Jewish community heard about his heroism, we felt that simply expressing our sorrow and outrage wasn't nearly enough," Bennett said. "After all, by all accounts, the detective likely saved Jersey City and the Jewish community from an even larger catastrophe."

Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop said the Jewish community in Brooklyn "truly did not forget" Jersey City.

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Seals, a 15-year police veteran, was killed at Bayview Cemetery on Garfield Avenue in the buildup to the shootout at a kosher supermarket on Martin Luther King Drive that left three people dead in addition to the two shooters.

Two of the victims, Leah Minda Ferencz, the owner of the JC Kosher Supermarket, and her cousin Moshe Hirsch Deutsch, were part of the city's small Orthodox Jewish community. Douglas Miguel Rodriguez Barzola, a native of Ecuador, worked in the market.

Also killed were the shooters, David Anderson and Francine Graham

Chesky Deutsch, a member of the Jersey City Orthodox Jewish community, said "Words cannot describe what I felt when I saw the men and women of law enforcement putting themselves in harm's way for my children, my community."

Seals, 40, of North Arlington, left behind a wife and five children, who have been recipients of generosity from many corners.

The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation in December announced that it had paid off the mortgage of Seals' North Arlington home. In January, a Pequannock car dealership donated a new minivan to the family.

Disbrow said Tuesday that more than $900,000 has been raised by the Jersey City Policemen's Benevolent Association, which will go into trust funds to be set upfor each of the Seals' five children.

Ricardo Kaulessar is a local reporter for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to the most important news from your local community, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: kaulessar@northjersey.com Twitter: @ricardokaul