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“Jewish Pirates and Lawyers of the Caribbean and their Fight against the Inquisition”

J.A. Sanchez-Dorta, Esq.

For some time I have considered the question: in what possible way can I assist the cause
of the Bnei Anusim?

Just about 7 years ago, after just over 40 years of living in blissful ignorance, I
discovered, through the oddest of circumstances, that I am likely descended, on my
mother’s side, from Spanish/Portuguese Jews.

My mother’s maiden name is Dorta, which is a very uncommon surname. There are
probably 5,000 Dorta’s alive today, the majority of whom live in Tenerife, the Canary
Islands (where my mother’s grandfather was from), with a few here and there spread
throughout the Caribbean, Brazil, Venezuela, Louisiana, England and the Netherlands,
and unless you move to the Canary Islands, it is unlikely that you will ever meet another
Dorta in your life.

The first record of a Dorta I could find was a Meir Dorta, signatory to the Jewish
Ordinances of Tudela, Spain in 1363. There was also a record of a Jewish Dorta living in
Madeira, Portugal, in 1492, as a sugarcane farmer. I also found a reference to a group of
Dorta’s, who historians note were the last Jewish printers in Portugal and printed the
astronomical tables of Abraham Zacuto used by Columbus and Vasco da Gama, among
others.

There was Garcia D’Orta, who sailed for India in 1534 as Chief Physician aboard the
fleet of his childhood friend, the future governor of Portuguese India.

The year after Garcia D’Orta died in 1568 his sister, Catarina D’Orta, was burned at the
stake by the Inquisition in Goa, and in 1580 his remains were exhumed and also burned.

I discovered that the Arquivo Nacional Torre do Tombo in Portugal records at least 20
Dorta’s who were arrested by the Inquisition, most of whom were arrested for the crime
of practicing Judaism.

Through simple searches in the internet, I found references to more and more Dorta’s,
and each and every one of them was referred to as either a Jew or a New Christian, until
the 1700’s, by which time the Dorta’s seem to have assimilated.

I felt a connection to these people. They helped me understand myself better, and in an
odd way, “the Blood Calls”. Their suffering from so long ago called out to me and I felt a
need to do something for them. I just didn’t know what I could do.

Then, just a few months ago, I came across an article about a woman named Sonya Loya,
and her amazing idea about a lawsuit on behalf of Bnei Anusim against the Inquisition,
and I was intrigued.

Nevertheless, to take on a case like this is no small challenge, and so I doubted whether I
should even reach out to Sonya.

So, I prayed a little, and then opened up my Bible straight to Ruth, at a point where it
says something like, “I thought I should speak to you about it so that you can redeem it if
you wish.” So, I considered it a potential message (maybe it is, maybe it isn’t, I don’t
know, but it’s good enough for me), and so I reached out to Sonya. Next thing I knew,
Sonya had me set up to meet some people in Israel, and then I received a request from a
friend, Dell Sanchez, who I had met just about a month before connecting with Sonya, to
submit a paper to this event at the very prestigious Netanya College. So it seemed that
things were beginning to move forward more quickly than I could have ever imagined.

Nevertheless, this is a very difficult case, for several reasons, and it is very much in its
initial stages.

Most of my fellow lawyers, when I first mention this case with them, are initially very
pessimistic about its potential, but as I begin to explain to them my strategy, at some
point in the conversation I see their eyes light up suddenly and they say “Hey, this could
work!”

This could work, but there are serious barriers that must be overcome.

First of all, of course, there is simply the time that has elapsed since the Inquisition and
the statute of limitations issues. Now, there are certain precedents in Holocaust related
litigation for overcoming the statute of limitations issues by alleging unjust enrichment.
Roughly, you have to show that the offending party or its successor still has the wealth
that was taken unjustly (that is, in violation of some law existing at the time of the bad
act), so that the statute of limitations hasn’t yet begin to run, and then you can sue for the
recovery of the wealth that was taken due to the bad act.

This same argument can be very useful in this case, because the Inquisition took very
good records, and thus I believe we will be able to trace some of the exact items and
funds unlawfully taken to where they are today. Nevertheless, the Holocaust litigation
based its claim for unjust enrichment under the US Alien Torts Claims Act, which did not
exist until 1790, and many of the crimes of the Inquisition were committed before then,
so that presented me with an issue.

Nevertheless, there are some very old precedents establishing certain rights of the
Anusim which I find quite promising.

For example, in 1645 near Recife, Brazil, Portuguese rebelling against the Dutch
captured a Dutch Militia that included a squadron of Jews led by a Jewish captain.
The Portuguese separated the Jews from the other prisoners, hanged all the Jewish
prisoners and burnt their captain alive. In their view, the Jewish prisoners, who had been
New Christians under the Portuguese and then had reverted to the practice of Judaism
when the Dutch had captured Recife, were traitors1 and heretics and deserved this
punishment.

The Parnassim in Amsterdam petitioned the States General in Holland, “With tears of
blood running from [our] hearts, order the government of Brazil to insure that in all
agreements with the enemy, members of the Hebrew Nation should be treated like other
Dutch subjects”.2

The States General on December 7, 1645, thus, issued the Patenta Onrossa (Honorable
Charter) declaring Holland’s Jews to be Dutch subjects, entitled to nearly all rights
pertaining to the burgher class. It instructed the Supreme Council in New Holland that,
“The Hebrew Nation in Brazil [is] to be protected from any damage to person or
property, in the same manner as all the citizens of the United Netherlands”.3

Now, there was a certain Jacob Dorta, who directly benefited (or should have benefitted)
from the Patenta Onrossa, as he was a Jew living in Recife at the time of the civil war.
Jacob Dorta is identified by one historian as one of the first three (openly) Jewish lawyers
in the Americas.

I have also discovered that there were actual Papal Bulls secured by the Anusim in
September and October of 1539, which insisted on certain rights of due process which
normally only existed in a civil trial (including the inadmissibility of evidence extracted
by torture, and punishment for false accusations) which were simply never enforced in
Portugal.4

Thus, the Anusim were very successful in their efforts to define their rights under the
law, nevertheless, it was impossible to enforce that law in the states in which the
Inquisition held sway.

For example, the Patenta Onrossa was put to a test in 1648 when Portuguese rebels seized

1 Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 143.
2
Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 143.
3
Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 144.
4
Being the Nacao in the Eternal City, James W. Nelson Novoa, page 130.
ten Jews from a Dutch ship and sentenced them to death5. The States General submitted a
formal demand to Portugal’s King John IV (at that time Holland and Portugal had an
executed peace pact and alliance against Spain) that these Jews be treated like other
Dutch subjects.

King John IV replied in 1649 that the rebels had assured him that those Dutch Jews who
had not been baptized would be set free, but that he couldn’t interfere in “heretical
matters involving false conversos”.6 The rebels turned certain of these Jews over to the
Inquisition.

King John’s reply is interesting. He is recognizing the validity of the law, but he is
interpreting it in his own fashion, and there was no independent tribunal at the time, with
the power of enforcement, to tell him that he was wrong.

These laws were on the books at the time, put there by the efforts of these Jews, these
laws were violated, and although it was impossible to stop the violation or sue for
damages based upon their violation at the time, because the Inquisition and their allied
countries could just take out theirs guns and say, “make us”, it is simply no longer the
case that they can take out their guns and say “make us”.

Thus, these laws were in place so many years ago, the unlawful acts occurred, the unjust
enrichment from the unlawful acts continue to this date so the statute of limitations hasn’t
begun to run, and today there are courts with enforcement power over the entities that to
this date unjustly hold property confiscated in violation of international law existing at
the time, which courts can force these entities to return the property. So, in many regards,
our ancestors have done most of the work for us.

There are numerous cases of Jews living under the protection of countries such as
England and Holland, who during their travels to, say, Portugal, were captured by the
Inquisition.

For example, I have found in Dutch notarial records a reference to a contract between
Felipe Dorta Henriques, a merchant in Amsterdam, and a Dutch skipper. Felipe Dorta
Henriques had also previously served the Dutch as a firearms instructor during the
conquest of Recife, and was the father of Jacob Dorta. The reference states that he went
to Lisbon on business in 1639, where he was imprisoned because of his religion by the
Inquisition, and that his Jewish alias is Moses Dorta. And he was no special case; there
are hundreds, perhaps thousands, like him. As an interesting coincidence, one of my
grandfather’s brothers was also named Felipe Dorta.

Another early precedent relating to the rights of persons of the “Hebrew Nation” is

5
Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page145.
6
Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 146.

offered by the Robles trial of 1656 in England. At that time London’s Jews, “though
calling themselves Portuguese, were considered Spanish subjects, and their goods were
therefore subject to seizure”7 due to the war between Spain and England. Antonio Robles
had two ships carrying wine and gold from the Canary Islands seized. The Jewish
community in London came to his defense, confronting Cromwell with a demand: “we
are not Portuguese Catholics; we are Jews and we want the right to worship and bury the
dead in our manner”.

In his book Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler explains:

“Robles followed suit. He petitioned the court for the recovery of his ships and goods on
the grounds that ‘he was of the Hebrew nation’. He recounted how he had been on the
run from the Inquisition that killed his father, tortured his mother, and burned at the stake
many close relatives…In the course of the trial, ten London Jews sent in affidavits
supporting his submission; others testified they knew Robles to be ‘of the Hebrew nation
and religion’. When the six week trial ended, the court declared Robles ‘a Jew borne in
Portugal’ and restored his ships, wine, and box of gold’.8

My argument might be:

1) There are precedents establishing the rights of the Anusim to be secure in their person
and property under international law;
2) These laws were violated by the Inquisition;
3) Due to these violations, the Inquisition and/or its successors have been unjustly
enriched to this date with certain property; and thus,
4) This property must be returned to its proper owners.

As a side note, Kritzler’s book notes that one of Robles’ more flamboyant supporters was
a fellow named Simon Jacob de Caceres, a fellow who once offered Cromwell to conquer
Spain’s New World empire with “people of my nation”. This fellow, at the Robles trial
testified with pride, “I am of the Jewish nation of the tribe of Judah” and was described
by a friend at the trial as a “proud Jew who made no more ado about not being a Christian
than how he had fought the dogs of the Inquisition on the Sea & Land”.9 I wonder if Mr.
Caceres, whose business and perhaps, ultimately, privateering (that is, legalized piracy)
interests stretched from the Caribbean throughout the Atlantic, could have ever imagined
that, 360 years later, he would still be fighting the Inquisition by providing us with the
legal precedents to do so.

Now, I do I have my concerns.

This is a difficult case, given the time that has passed, given the deep pockets of my
adversaries, as well as a whole host of other reasons which I don’t feel it is such a good
idea to discuss today, since I don’t want to give a heads up to my future opposing

7 Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 197.
8 Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 198.
9 Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, Edward Kritzler, page 201.
counsel. I say let them do their own homework.

Plus, some people take lawsuits very personally, and some might consider this an attack
on the Catholic Church, although it is far from that. I was raised as a Catholic, and my
parents and grandparents are Catholic. Although I no longer believe in the Catholic view
of the way the spiritual realm works, I have a great deal of respect for the awe of God that
the Catholic Church has instilled in so many people all over the world, as well as the
Church’s tremendous works of charity. I am particularly grateful for the efforts of a very
kind priest I knew when I was younger who did a great many good things for the poor of
New York, and people of the Catholic Church like him. Let’s not forget, Mother Teresa
was a Catholic nun.

My issue, quite simply, is with the Inquisition, what it did, and the after effects of what it
did – it stole a proud religious tradition from an ancient people, broke up families and
ripped from them their only means of sustenance, and forced these people to betray their
true beliefs and their community.

I think proper “penance”, if you want to use that term, must be sought and given.

The goal, as is my impression based on my discussions with Sonya Loya, would be to try
to get the property confiscated by the Inquisition to fund the return of the Bnei Anusim to
Israel. I think there would be an element of poetic justice in this and that it could,
perhaps, just perhaps, give some purpose to this suffering that happened so long ago, the
effects of which continue to this day.

We may even look at it this way -the Inquisition may have jailed the Anusim, tortured
them, burnt them at the stake in some cases, and taken their property, but the ultimate
effect would be that the Inquisition was unwittingly holding that property so that it would
be in one place (almost like a bank deposit, or a trust, of several centuries duration) for
when the time was right for a use that they, the Anusim, would have approved of, that is,
their descendants’ return to Israel.

The necessity of doing this with an unjust enrichment claim, rather than a claim for
damages, as Dell pointed out to me, oddly enough fits well with Obadiah 1:17, which
reads, “And on Mount Zion there shall be a remnant, and it shall be holy, and the House
of Jacob shall inherit those who inherited them.”, which can be read to suggest that those
of the house of Jacob will simply take back their inheritance that was unjustly inherited
by others.

The central thesis of the book by Kritzler in his book, Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean,
seems to be this – the Jews expelled from Spain were very much involved in the
discovery and development of the New World, in an attempt to escape the Inquisition,
which imprisoned them, took their children, took their wealth, and sometimes burned
them at the stake, and that certain Jews fought back against the Inquisition, through
piracy, conspiracy, and the law.
I used that book, and the references it made to people and places, to research the Dorta’s,
discovering through my research that they lived in each place, and were closely involved
with almost each of the main persons, discussed in that book. So as far as I can
understand, they were also involved in that fight against the Inquisition, which had
imprisoned so many Dorta’s until the point that, for the very sake of the survival of the
Dorta’s, they simply had to stop fighting. At this point in history, I think it is time for this
Dorta to take up that fight once again and I am simply here to make an open invitation to
anyone (lawyers, researchers, academics, genealogists, students, anyone) who wants to
join me, and the very prescient Sonya Loya, in that fight.