Home Industries Law R.I. Supreme Court rules Newport congregation can be evicted from historic synagogue

R.I. Supreme Court rules Newport congregation can be evicted from historic synagogue

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PBN Staff

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04/14/2025

Touro — THE R.I. SUPREME Court has upheld a lower court ruling that a New York group can evict Congregation Jeshuat Israel from Touro Synagogue. its longtime home in Newport. / COURTESY TOURO SYNAGOGUE

PROVIDENCE – The R.I. Supreme Court has upheld a lower court ruling that a New York group can evict Congregation Jeshuat Israel from Touro Synagogue, its longtime home in Newport. The state’s high court on April 10 affirmed a 2023 ruling by R.I. Superior Court Judge Maureen B. Keough that determined Congregation Shearith Israel, owners

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PROVIDENCE – The R.I. Supreme Court has upheld a lower court ruling that a New York group can evict Congregation Jeshuat Israel from Touro Synagogue, its longtime home in Newport. The state’s high court on April 10 affirmed a 2023 ruling by R.I. Superior Court Judge Maureen B. Keough that determined Congregation Shearith Israel, owners of the synagogue, could evict the Newport group, which has called Turo Synagogue its home for 140 years. However, Keough granted a stay of execution pending appeal of the case. “Accordingly, our review of the record reveals that the trial justice did not err in entering judgment in favor of Shearith Israel, granting it ‘the right to take immediate possession of the [p]remises together with the appurtenances and paraphernalia belonging thereto in accordance with the 1903 and 1908 leases,” R.I. Supreme Chief Justice Paul A. Suttell wrote in the ruling. “For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the judgment of the Superior Court.” The R.I. Supreme Court's ruling also allows Shearith Israel to claim the synagogue's possessions, including its set of Colonial-era bells, valued at $7.4 million. Built in 1763, Touro Synagogue is the oldest synagogue building in the nation and a national historic site. The R.I. Supreme Court’s ruling is the latest action in a lengthy fight over control of the Touro Synagogue. In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in a fight over control of the synagogue’s bells. Jeshuat Israel wanted to sell the bells to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. However, that U.S. Supreme Court decision declared the New York congregation the rightful owner of the building, which has been leasing the synagogue to Congregation Jeshuat Israel since the 1900s. In February 2022, Shearith Israel filed a motion in R.I. District Court to evict the longtime occupants, Congregation Jeshuat Israel, in light of a long-standing dispute with the Newport congregation’s board of directors. However, in August 2022, R.I. District Court Judge Colleen M. Hastings ruled in favor of Congregation Jeshuat Israel, and dismissed the New York congregation’s motion to evict. In October 2023, Keough ruled a tenant eviction notice Jeshuat Israel sent to Congregation Shearith Israel was legally valid, though granted a stay pending appeal.