Metro

NJ Rabbi Fred Neulander, who paid hitmen $30K to kill wife so he could be with his mistress, dies in prison

A New Jersey rabbi who paid $30,000 for two hitmen to kill his wife t꧋hree decades ago so he could be with his Philadelphia radio personality mistress has died in prison.

Fred Neulander, 82, was found unresponsive in an infirmary unit in the ꩵNew Jersey State Prison in Trenton on Wednesday, the state Department of Corrꦐections announced.

He was transported to Capita𝐆l Health Regional Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead sometime before 6:13 p.m., . 

As of Saturday morning, no cause 💯of d𝄹eath had been released.

At trial in 2001, prosecutors argued Rabbi Fred Neulander wanted to get rid of wife Carol to continue his two-year affair with Philadelphia radio host Elaine Soncini. AP
Carol Neulander, 52, was murdered on Nov. 1, 1994. AP

Neulander founded the Congregati🧸on M’kor🥀 Shalom Reform Jewish synagogue in Cherry Hill in 1974. 

The rabbi and his wife, Carol Neulander, 52, w🍸ere well-known in the community through both the shul and Classic Cakes, the popu❀lar bakery Carol co-founded, .

The mother of 3 had just returned from the baker🐠y when she꧃ bludgeoned to death with a lead pipe in the couple’s Cherry Hill home on the evening of Nov. 1, 1994, the outlet said.

The scene was staged to look like a robbery gone wrong, but investigators were puzzled by the fact that nothing else in the h💖ouse was moved or taken, the Phila💮delphia Inquirer reported.

Len Jenoff confessed to killing Carol Neulander at her husband’s request. AP

Neulander was indicted for the murder in 1999, but the case did not come together until the following year, when private investigator Len Jenoff told poliꦓce that the rabbi paid him and another man, Paul Daniels, $30,000 to kill his wife.

At trial in 2001, prosecutors argued that the rabbi wanted to get rid of Carolꦗ to continue his two-year affair with Philadelphia radio host Elaine Soncini.

Soncini, who was Catholic, had even supposedly converted to Judaism to be with the rabbi, whom she met when he performed ൲funeral rites for her late hus🦩band.

Neulander was conv✨inced his marriage to Carol was over, but believed divorce would bring him shame in the community, prosecutor James Lynch suggested.

Fred Neulander was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison in 2002. AP

On the night of the murder, Neulander made a point of b༺eing seen by others at the synagogue to have a solid alibi for when Carol was killed, Jenoff testified.

The case became a media sensation, and was .

When the first trial ended in a hung jur൩y, the 2002 r🌞etrial was moved from Camden County to Monmouth County to downplay the local scrutiny.

Following the retrial, Neulander was convicted of Carol’s murde🀅r. He narrowly avoided the death penalty and was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison.

Soncini testified against Neulander at both trials, as did two of his three chil🥃dren.

Paul Daniels admitted on the stand that he and Jenoff took money from Fred Neulander for killing his wife. AP

The middle child, Matthew Neulander, then 29, referred to hi꧂s father as “Fred” on the stand, and testified t♋hat he heard him tell Carol that their marriage was “over” shortly before the killing.

Two years after Neulander’s convicti🐼on, the case was immortalized in t💧he true crime book “” by PBS contributor Arthur Magida.

The murder of Carol Neulander was also t🐎he basis for several documentaries and even a musical, “A Wicked Soul in Cherry Hill,” that ran briefly in Los Angeles in 2022, the Inquirer noted.

Jenoff and Daniels were releasedꩵ from prison in 2014, the Inquirer said. The state appeals court rejected Neulander’s bid to overturn his conviction in 2016.

Congregation M’kor Shalom merged with another synagogue in the early 2000s and is 🦋now known as Congregatiꦯon Kol Ami.

“Fred Neulander’s … leadership of the congregation ended many years ago under well-publicized circumstances that ran counter to the values our congregation holds dear,” Kol Ami Rabbi Jannifer Frenkel said in a statement to the Inquirer on Friday.

“Rather than dwell on the past, we at Congregation Kol Ami … choose to focus on our future,” she added.