Lawyer Accused of Online Harassment of Father’s Dead Sea Scrolls Rival
A New York City lawyer whose father is a Dead Sea Scrolls scholar at the University of Chicago has been charged with online impersonation of one of the professor’s rivals.
The lawyer, Raphael Haim Golb, was accused of opening an online account in the name of NYU professor Lawrence Schiffman, then sending e-mails in Schiffman’s name that claimed he plagiarized scroll scholarship, the Associated Press reports. Golb, who received his law degree from NYU, was charged with identify theft, criminal impersonation and harassment, according to the Chicago Tribune and the New York Times.
Golb’s father, Norman Golb, told the Tribune that his son’s arrest “has everything to do with the politics of the scrolls.” Schiffman and the elder Golb differ over authorship of the scrolls.
“The fact of the matter is that if I understand it, Raphael was responding to the attacks on me,” Golb said. “I suppose my son felt it was important to get things straight.”
Antonia Merzon, an assistant district attorney in Manhattan, spoke at a news conference announcing the younger Golb’s arrest, the Times says.
“This exemplifies a growing trend in the area of identity theft,” Merzon said. “It’s very easy to open an account using any name you want on the Internet. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with that. But when you start using another person’s true identity for some purpose, you’re crossing the line into a possible identity theft crime or impersonation crime.”
