Millionaire slumlord's family offer $25,000 to find his killers after he was kidnapped, strangled and burned in a dumpster



Menachem Stark, 39, kidnapped in Brooklyn and murdered last week

Body was found smoldering in a dumpster by police on Friday



Some have speculated the killing was over debts in property business

The family of a New York real estate developer whose body was found smoldering in a dumpster last week has increased the reward to $25,000 to find his killers.



Slumlord Menachem 'Max' Stark, 39, was abducted outside his Brooklyn, New York office during a snowstorm last Thursday. His smoldering body was found in a gas station dumpster in Long Island on Friday.



Stark's family held a press conference on Monday where they begged the killer of the married father of eight to come forward.



Menachem 'Max' Stark (above) was murdered and his smoldering body found dumped at a Long Island gas station in January 2014. Two brothers were arrested in connection with the crime on Thursday

Grief: Hundreds of mourners carried the coffin of Stark through the streets of Brooklyn during his funeral in January 2014. Stark was a member of the ultra-Orthodox Satmar Hasidic sect

Brother-in-law Moses Strulowitz told the New York Post: 'We are not, as Hasidic, Orthodox Jewish people, looking for revenge.' He added: 'God will punish them no matter what happens.' Stark was branded a slumlord and a loan shark, and was accused of running substandard housing blocks, one of which was declared 'hazardous to life'. Stark's business partner now appears to be fearing for his life following his colleague's violent death.

Security guards have been seen outside the home of Stark's business partner Israel 'Sam' Perlmutter, 42, which is just blocks away from the house of murdered Stark. Some have suggested that Stark was killed because of debts in the housing business, which he shared with Perlmutter, after defaulting on a $29million loan in 2008. According to the Post, Perlmutter now fears that whoever murdered Stark is coming for him and has 'loaded up with security guards' since the killing. According to the paper, 'any number of people' wanted Stark dead including nearly all of his dozens of business associates and hundreds of tenants. Tradition: The funeral took place in Williamsburg just hours after Stark's badly burned body was found in a Dumpster on Long Island

However family members have now hit back, saying that the rumours have been created by a few people envious of Stark's success.

According to the New York Daily News, Stark's brother said: 'He was a good man, and he helped everyone. 'You know how people are. They’re looking for gossip... People are jealous because he was successful.'

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Hundreds of members of a Hasidic community gathered on Saturday in Brooklyn for an emotional funeral service honoring Stark.

Somber mourners dressed all in black came together at the Lodiner Bais Medrash synagogue in Williamsburg to pay tribute to Stark, whose charred remains were discovered in a dumpster on Long Island on Friday afternoon.

Detectives investigating the case are finding a that Stark left a trail of unpaid contractors, ripped-off tenants and tens of millions in debts related to the 17 properties he owned in the Williamsburg and Greenpoint neighborhoods of Brooklyn, according to the Post. His tenants were also furious. His 17 buildings had received 233 complaints and 148 violations - 49 of which were still open.

Many tenants told the Post his properties were infested with rodents, sometimes didn't have heat or water and had shabby interiors.

'I’ve had many conversations with him, and of course in many of those conversations I wanted to kill him myself,' Greg Hanlon, who lived in one of Stark's Greenpoint buildings, joked to the Post. In 2009, according to the newspaper, one of Stark's buildings was so rundown, the city ordered all tenants to vacate and deemed it no acceptable to live in.

Kind words: Speakers talked about Stark's well-known generosity and readiness to help those less fortunate

Tenants were forced to track Stark down in order to get back the four-months deposit they had put down.



'He pretty much ripped off the whole building,' a tenant organizer, Ryan Kuonen, said.

'They kept trying to serve him, and he kept hiding from them. When he’d hear "Are you Max Stark," he would take off running.'

Said one detective working the case: 'He f***ed a lot of people over.'



Some neighbors told police that he was also a neighborhood 'loan shark,' according to the Post. He lent thousands to friends and then demanded it back with interest.



'He's a scammer,' a source told the Post.



In accordance with Jewish tradition, Stark's funeral service and burial took place just hours after police identified the scorched body found at a Great Neck, New York, gas station as the missing real estate developer who was forced into a van during Thursday's blizzard.

During the ceremony, which was conducted in Yiddish and was frequently interrupted by ritual wailing, speakers described Stark as a pillar of the Satmar Hasidic community who was always ready to help the less fortunate with money for food and rent, The Jewish Daily Forward reported.

A body was found at around 4pm on Friday in Great Neck with extensive burns. A police source told the New York Daily News that the victim was likely suffocated before his killers wrapped his body in fabric, stuffed him into a trash bin at a gas station and set fire to his corpse.



Fernando Cerff, the owner of the Getty gas station on Cutter Mill Road, told the paper that Friday morning his workers were shoveling snow when they noticed smoke rising from the Dumpster.

Thinking that someone had tossed a cigarette inside, they sprinkled some snow into the container.

When Cerff approached the Dumpster in the afternoon, he noticed a horrible stench coming from the bin.



Cerff became suspicious and called police, which immediately discovered the body amidst the trash beneath a layer of snow.



This development comes as cops released dramatic surveillance footage that shows the suspects forcing Stark into a Dodge Caravan after he left his offices in Williamsburg late on Thursday evening.

Caught on camera: Police found security camera footage of the suspects' car, circled

Officers say the incident happened at around 11.20pm, when Stark was grabbed by two men on Rutledge Street in South Williamsburg. Some reports suggest he was carrying $4,000 in cash.

DNA Info reported that Stark was approached and manhandled into a light-colored van by two men as he left his office at Southside Associates at 331 Rutledge Street.

His wife, Bashie, apparently became concerned when Stark did not return after midnight and contacted Shomrim, a neighborhood patrol group for the Orthodox community.

Surveillance footage was then discovered in Stark's office that shows a struggle with one man, before the van pulls up and he is wrestled by two men into the vehicle.

Investigations: The incident was looked into by the police and the Shomrim, a neighborhood patrol group for the Orthodox community, who produced this report