The security forces captured Yoel Alter, 35, one of the leaders of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect Lev Tahor, in Guatemala in response to an extradition request from Mexico for human trafficking. Alter, originally from Israel, was detained in the historic center of Guatemala City by agents of the National Civil Police and Interpol after Mexican authorities requested him.
Since 2022, Mexican authorities have been investigating members of the Lev Tahor sect for human trafficking and sexual abuse of minors. In that same year, a group of children was rescued in Tapachula, and on November 21, 160 minors were rescued in Guatemala, where at least three cases of forced marriages have been discovered.
The Lev Tahor organization, which established itself in Guatemala in 2013, has had conflicts with indigenous residents and faces judicial processes in Canada, Mexico, and Guatemala for similar crimes against minors. The sect practices child marriages, imposes full covering with tunics on women from the age of 3, and resorts to corporal punishment.
Recently, Guatemalan authorities reported forced marriages among the minors rescued from Lev Tahor, where three minors, including a 17-year-old teenager, were forced to marry and threatened not to report. The State of Guatemala has taken care of 135 minors separated from the sect since December 20, when they were found in Santa Rosa.
Emmanuel Cardona, another leader of Lev Tahor, was arrested in January 2025 by Guatemalan authorities when he attempted to leave the country to El Salvador and faces charges of rape and other crimes. Lev Tahor, founded in Jerusalem in 1988 by Rabbi Shlomo Helbrans, has faced similar accusations in places like Brooklyn, United States, where it has been accused of child abuse, pedophilia, and kidnappings, as well as in Chiapas, Mexico.
The sect has been the subject of investigations by Guatemalan authorities, who seek to clarify cases of sexual violations, forced pregnancies, and other possible crimes committed against minors.