To report or not to report?  There is no question!
 
THE CASE:
 
Because we publicly spoke out against Rabbi Freundel, and supported the allegations against him, we have been made to feel unwelcome in our Orthodox synagogue. The rabbi specifically told us not to speak about the allegations against Freundel, which he considered to be lashon hara. http://www.myjewishlearning.com/blog/the-torch/author/emmashulevitz/
 
THE QUESTION:
 
A person believes that she or he has been touched sexually in an  unwanted, unsolicited, halakhically forbidden, and therefore abusive fashion.

 

The Orthodox rabbinic institutional establishment argues
 
1.   it is forbidden to  inform the Gentiles of the bad acts of a Jew.  It is proper to suffer in silence.
2.   Even if you really were sexually abused, how can you and how dare you shame the Orthodox community by airing dirty laundry in public.  Your complaint makes our crowd look bad. Do the right thing and do not foul our communal nest.
3.   Great rabbis have ruled that we consult them and not to the police when there are complaints of sexual abuse. You cannot know the consequences of your going outside the community in order to find satisfaction for your complaint.  Are you prepared to compare your simple-minded, naive reading of the Torah  to those great rabbis who forbid your going to the police with your complaint.
4. Worse than being sexually abused in private is shaming the entire Orthodox community and its rabbinic leadership in public. Since a sincerely Orthodox would not shame the community, we as an Orthodox community will shun you socially for bringing us, your friends, neighbors, and holy rabbis, to shame—and to account.
 
 ONE MODERN ORTHODOX ANSWER
 
1.   According to normative Orthodox Jewish Civil Law, Hoshen Mishpat 425:1, instances of sexual abuse are supposed to reported to the civil authorities.   Deuteronomy 13:1-6 reminds Jewry that Torah law is absolute, i.e. not allowing for change on the part of false dreamers, prophets, or, for that matter, institutionally affiliating Orthodox rabbis who are so great that they  get to cherrypick the quotes that justify their special situation. 
2.   When the law of pursuer, i.e.  the case of an endangering, threatening person, conflicts with the law of the informer, i.e. a person tattling to the Gentile authorities regarding the misdeeds of a Jew, the law of the pursuer, that requires that the threatening offender be stopped at all cost, prevails. In Judaism, innocent people have rights, too.  
3.   Core Jewish law really is humane, logical, and reasonable. But this Core Jewish law has been superseded, suppressed , and for those reasons, un-discussed. 
4.   Judaism is about “doing the right and the good.” [Deuteronomy6:18]. Looking good while acting badly looks bad in God’s eyes. We are required to pursue justice  [Deuteronomy 16:20], not each other. An Orthodox community that forbids mixed dancing while tolerating mixed groping is unorthodox in, and of, the extreme.  Before throwing our first stones, we should be in God’s grace without sin. An Orthodox community that wants to be free of shame will take the steps, and its risks, to shame its shameful offenders.
5.   An informed, observant Jew will follow the divine Law, not the mindless herd. Let's learn this Core Jewish law together.   It has been asked, “is it possible that all Jewry really be wrong, when our pious rabbis tell us not to tattle to the authorities and rattle our communal cage?”  Not only does the Hoshen Mishpat 425:1 say that we all may be wrong, the Bible at Lamentations 5:7 and Leviticus 4:13 say so as well.  So let us protect the innocent, comply with Hoshen Mishpat 425:1, and obey God.
6. If we do not want to have our dirty little—and large—misdeeds discussed in public, we would do well not to do those deeds even in private.
 
 

 

(This answer, necessarily brief and sketchy, is based upon the CCAR responsum no. 5757.1, available in Reform Responsa for the Twenty-First Century (New York: CCAR Press, 2010), vol. 1, pp. 347-356. See that responsum for a fuller discussion, along with citation of halakhic sources.)

 

The victim of sexual harassment may – or may not - have valid reasons not to report that harassment to the police. But Jewish law is not one of those reasons. To answer your question precisely, Jewish law does not “trump” civil law in criminal matters. When a Jew commits a crime, there is no halakhic prohibition against reporting that act to the authorities, especially in a democratic society where Jews enjoy equality and the full rights of citizenship.

 

The relevant principle here is dina d’malkhuta dina, “the law of the state is valid law.” According to that principle, which occurs several times in the Talmud, Jewish law recognizes the halakhic validity of a wide range of actions taken by non-Jewish legal authorities in the sphere of civil, criminal, and monetary law. Now this recognition has its limits; not every act of non-Jewish authorities is accepted as valid under the halakhah. Our tradition does not accept the right of the civil government to intervene in matters that pertain exclusively to matter os isur v’heter, Jewish ritual law. And even in non-ritual (“civil”) matters, the halakhah accepts the validity of the law of the state – dina d’malkhuta – only when it is truly “law,” that is, when it falls within the confines of legitimate state authority. State authority is “legitimate” when it serves ends that are traditionally recognized as part of government’s proper function: for example, laws that levy taxes, that provide for the public welfare, that regulate property, contracts, and business activity, and so forth. So long as these laws apply equally to all citizens and draw no unfair distinctions among them, they are regarded as valid under the halakhah, simply because political communities are entitled to legislate in these areas.

 

One of the spheres of legitimate governmental authority is that of criminal conduct. All states are empowered – indeed, they are obliged – to protect their people against violations of their persons and property. Laws that define and punish the offense of sexual harassment clearly and obviously come under this rubric. They are proper expressions of legitimate state authority, and for that reason they are regarded as valid under Jewish law.

 

One occasionally will hear, in objection to the above, the argument that Jewish law prohibits us from surrendering a fellow Jew to the jurisdiction of Gentile courts. Such a prohibition, if it exists in theory, cannot seriously be said to apply to the legal system of a state in which we Jews enjoy equal rights and full citizenship. The law courts of such a country are not “Gentile” courts; they are our courts, belonging to us no less than to anyone else. When we freely accept this citizenship and participate equally with our fellow citizens in the making of the laws, we can hardly claim that we are somehow exempt from the enforcement of those laws or that they apply to everybody but the Jews. Such a claim is absurd, even outrageous, to the point that it constitutes a chilul hashem, a profanation of God’s holy name. So long as it is legitimate in its authority and equitable in its application, the laws of the state – including the laws concerning sexual harassment – are obligatory upon us just as they are obligatory upon all the other citizens of the state.