Some Interesting Facts Are Dripping Out

On Sunday, The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article about the recent release of Jeffrey Epstein’s calendar. It’s not as interesting as the release of his client list would be, but it’s a start.

The article reports:

Jeffrey Epstein‘s newly-released private calendar revealed he had scheduled meetings with a slew of prominent individuals, including the current CIA director, after he was convicted as a sex offender. 

The documents contain emails and scheduled meetings with now-CIA Director William Burns, Bard College president Leon Botstein, Obama’s White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler and professor Noam Chomsky.

The meetings were scheduled between 2013 to 2017 after the pedophile had served time in jail in 2008 for sex crimes involving a teenage girl. 

The purpose of the meetings was not revealed in the trove of documents, which were obtained by The Wall Street Journal and published on Sunday. 

The article concludes:

All of the meetings with Epstein happened before federal investigators accused him with a slew of sex-trafficking crimes. The charges happened after media reports of his sweetheart deal in Florida in 2008 that saw him quietly serve time for sex crimes.

The reports sparked backlash and fervor over the deal with Epstein.

Prosecutors then charged and arrested Epstein. He was found dead in his federal jail cell as he awaited trial on the latest charges. Officials ruled his death a suicide, but there have been questions raised on if foul play was involved.

Epstein’s mistress, Ghislaine Maxwell, was convicted of crimes related to the sex ring and sentenced to 20 years in prison. She is appealing her conviction.

Virginia Roberts also sued Prince Andrew for his alleged role in Epstein’s sex ring. The case ended when a settlement was reached in February 2022, with Andrew paying a reported $12million.

These meetings happened after Jeffrey Epstein had served his time in jail. All that can really be concluded is that Jeffrey Epstein had a lot of very powerful contacts who were willing to meet with him. Because the client list has never been released (and probably never will be), we have only suspicions–no evidence. There are too many people in high places involved for the truth to ever come out!

Victims, But No Perpetrators?

On Thursday, The American Thinker posted an article about the strange case of Ghislaine Maxwell. Ms. Maxwell was originally sentenced to 20 years in the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, Connecticut. The Institution in Danbury is known for bad food and small cells. Then, almost magically, she was transferred to a low-security federal correctional institution in Florida that includes various “recreation, leisure and social programs” designed to “help develop an individual wellness concept.”

The article notes:

Specifically, her case has set before us the question of whether we, as a people, are willingly turning a blind eye to our government’s complicity in protecting the anonymity of the powerful and elite among us whom our government knows to have participated in the sex trafficking of children. Or, will we take a stand and demand that our government reveal the identities of the criminal pedophiles that Epstein and Maxwell “serviced” for nearly 25 years and compel them to hold these criminals accountable for their crimes?

How we choose to answer that question will likely define our nation’s moral trajectory for many years to come.

To those who may doubt this characterization of our government’s corruption, perhaps it will help for them to pause and consider the implications of the following facts:

In typical criminal cases involving more than one perpetrator, one primary reason that a prosecutor would offer a plea deal to a defendant is to extract — i.e. legally extort — information from that defendant about others who may have been involved in the crimes at issue — e.g. like the pedophiles who raped the young girls she and Epstein provided.

In Maxwell’s case, however, the prosecutors evidently decided this would not be necessary. In fact, they did just the opposite. Attempting to appear tough and unrelenting to the public, the prosecutors informed Ms. Maxwell — and thus, the public — that she would be offered no plea deals whatsoever.

The article has two theories on the reason Maxwell was not offered a plea deal. The first is that they did not want to risk exposing the client list to the public. The article notes that the trial was conducted in a way that prevented any client was identified in court. The second reason (I think more likely) is that the government already had all of the client information from things they seized at Epstein’s island and Manhattan mansion.

The article concludes:

Under the present circumstances of her life, the only thing that could make such a deal any sweeter for Maxwell, is if our government also secretly agreed with her to a prearranged sentence reduction at a future time provided that, even after her release, she must take her secrets to the grave to avoid the risk of triggering the ever- available “suicide” option lurking in the background.

Given the totality of this reality, one can readily understand Maxwell’s silence.

What can’t be understood, nor tolerated, however, is our acquiescence to our government’s unlawful complicity in that silence.

The question is, of course, do we as a nation have the moral fortitude to take the actions necessary to expose and bring to justice the ghouls our government is presently allowing to roam among us and who are, in fact, a threat to our children?

Or will we, as a nation take the easier path and buy into the fiction corrupt officials within our government are currently attempting to sell:

That Maxwell really is the only person in history to be convicted for trafficking children for sex …to apparently nobody.

I guess the lesson here is that if you are going to commit a horrendous crime, make sure you have evidence on those in power who committed it with you.

We Have Reached Peak Insanity

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported that U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart will hold a hearing regarding the unsealing of the search warrant affidavit. Is it appropriate for the Magistrate who issued the search warrant to determine whether or not anyone can see the affidavit related to it? Are we supposed to overlook the fact that this Magistrate is loosely connected to Jeffrey Epstein? Those are just two of the questions I have about this case.

The article reports:

Reinhart will hold the hearing on Aug. 18 in the West Palm Beach Division, according to Fox News. The judge will opine whether the Department of Justice (DOJ) must unseal the search warrant materials for the raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence, which likely include the search warrant affidavit. The DOJ is expected to argue to keep the document sealed, the New York Post reported.

…The DOJ adamantly opposes the release of the search warrant affidavit, which would include testimony from federal agents justifying the raid and information about witnesses. Assistant U.S. Attorney Juan Antonio Gonzalez argued making the affidavit public would risk “the integrity of an ongoing law enforcement investigation that implicates national security.”

Somehow I just don’t believe them.

The article concludes:

Attorney General Merrick Garland, who personally approved the raid, said at a press conference recently that FBI agents could be subject to increased threats as a result of the search.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has requested the DOJ provide updates detailing the process of the search, which documents the FBI found, and how their release would impact national security.

Reinhart signed off on the search warrant that allowed the FBI to raid Mar-a-Lago. Reinhart, however, has ties to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, the Miami Herald reported. Reinhart quit his job as a U.S. attorney in 2008 and went to work for Epstein, according to the report. Reinhart was in private practice for 10 years before becoming a federal magistrate in 2018.

I heard a comment on the radio today that said generally the people pushing for transparency are the good guys. I suspect that is true in this case.

Don’t Expect To Learn All Of The Gory Details

The Ghislaine Maxwell trial begins today. According to a Daily Caller article posted today, The presiding judge will be U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama in 2011. Judge Nathan has already agreed with Ghislaine Maxwell’s request to keep certain details in the criminal case against her secret — finding that information would be too “sensational and impure” to reveal to the public.

The New York Post is reporting today:

Ghislaine Maxwell, the accused longtime madam of pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein, is going on trial Monday — beginning the final act of criminal proceedings against the disgraced socialite that could be the last chance at justice for the duo’s alleged victims.

The first order of business was to finalize jury selection — picking the 12 jurors and six alternates who will hear the sensational case — with opening statements expected to follow later in the day.

The start of Maxwell’s highly awaited trial drew a mass of media to the Lower Manhattan courthouse. Alleged Epstein victim Sarah Ransome, attorney Lisa Bloom and Maxwell’s sister Isabel were also spotted arriving.

Maxwell, who has been in custody since her arrest last year, was hauled into court in a white sweater.

If convicted on all counts, Maxwell faces a maximum sentence of 70 years in prison — effectively a life sentence for the 59-year-old, who has been jailed in a Brooklyn lockup since her arrest.

Maxwell faces six counts for allegedly recruiting, grooming and abusing four minor girls with Epstein at multiple locations in the US and the UK from 1994 through 2004. 

Her crimes included engaging in “group sexual encounters” with Epstein and an underage girl — identified in court documents as “Minor Victim-1” — from 1994 to 1997, prosecutors charge in the indictment against her.

Obviously under normal circumstances there would be the potential for some very recognizable people to be named in this trial. I think the Judge’s ruling will probably prevent that. The fact that Ghislaine Maxwell is still alive could be considered an indication that the people who might have been implicated by a Jeffrey Epstein trial are somehow now protected. The trial might also be an indication that the Clinton family is no longer powerful enough to prevent any embarrassment that might come from the trial. There are a number of high-level government and corporate executives whose names appear on the flight logs of the plane to Epstein’s island. It will be interesting to see how much press those flight logs get. They have been public for a while, but not posted in mainstream sources. Let’s see if that changes.

I Suspect There Is More To This Story

Yesterday The New York Post reported that the two guards responsible for guarding Jeffrey Epstein have admitted that they falsified records detailing their activities during the time that they were supposed to be checking on him.

The article reports:

Tova Noel and Michael Thomas admitted that they “willfully and knowingly” lied on forms stating that they’d made the required rounds checking on inmates the night of Epstein’s August 2019 suicide

Prosecutors said the guards were sleeping and surfing the web when they should have been monitoring the maximum security federal prisoner, who had recently been on suicide watch at the Metropolitan Correctional Center.

Under a plea deal announced Friday, they will avoid jail time in connection with their misconduct.

Instead, the disgraced duo will be required to complete 100 hours of community service and cooperate with a federal probe, according to the agreement, which must be approved by a judge.

This is a very odd story. There are a lot of twist and turns in this saga–why was Jeffrey Epstein left alone in his cell when he was supposedly a suicide risk? Why have all of the surveillance tapes from the time of death mysteriously disappeared? Isn’t it interesting that the two prison guards have avoided jail time? I hate to be cynical, but someone should take a good look at their bank accounts in recent years to see if there were any strange deposits.

This Could Be Very Informative And Very Sickening

The U.K. Daily Mail is reporting today that Judge Loretta Preska in Manhattan ruled on Thursday to unseal more than 80 documents that Ghislaine Maxwell had wanted to keep under wraps. These documents include flight logs, police reports, communications between Ms. Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein from January 2015 when Virginia Roberts Giuffre made allegations against Jeffrey Epstein, and a 2016 deposition in which Ms. Maxwell’s lawyers claim she was asked intrusive questions about her sex life.

The article reports:

A judge today has ordered the unsealing of a vast tranche of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein, which could shed light on his friendship with powerful men accused of having sex with his victims.

Judge Loretta Preska said that 80 documents – which will run to hundreds of pages – should be made public within a week.

The documents will include depositions from Ghislaine Maxwell, which could explain her alleged role in Epstein’s sex trafficking operation.

They could include details about Maxwell’s sex life that her lawyers have previously tried to stop from being released, relating to a seven-hour, 418-page deposition Maxwell gave which her legal team said was ‘extremely personal, confidential’.

In filings Maxwell’s lawyers have called the depositions a ‘series of (efforts) to compel Maxwell to answer intrusive questions about her sex life’.

The documents will also include communications between Maxwell and Epstein from January 2015 when Virginia Roberts made explosive allegations about them in court papers.

In the papers Roberts claimed she was forced to have sex with Prince Andrew three times when she was just 17 at Epstein’s command. 

The case is separate from the criminal proceedings against Maxwell, 58, who is accused by federal prosecutors of procuring girls as young as 14 for Epstein to abuse. She has pleaded not guilty and is due to stand trial next year.

She is innocent until proven guilty, but I have a feeling that a lot of young girls could have been saved a lot of pain if she and Jeffrey Epstein had been brought to trial when the charges against them first came to light.

This Could Get Very Interesting

The New York Post is reporting today that longtime Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell was arrested Thursday on a six-count indictment charging her with grooming young girls for sex.

The article reports:

The British socialite, 58, was arrested by the FBI in New Hampshire around 8:30 a.m., sources told The Post.

The just-unsealed indictment charges stem from Maxwell’s role “in the sexual exploitation and abuse of multiple minor girls by Jeffrey Epstein” as early as 1994, court papers say.

“The victims were as young as 14 years old when they were groomed and abused by Maxwell and Epstein, both of whom knew that certain victims were in fact under the age of 18,” the indictment says.

She is specifically accused of grooming three underage victims for sex with Epstein in places including his Upper East Side townhouse, Florida, New Mexico and London.

Maxwell is charged with six counts — conspiracy to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts, enticement of a minor to travel to engage in illegal sex acts, conspiracy to transport minors with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, transportation of a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity and two counts of perjury.

There are a few things to note here. Maxwell was arrested by the FBI–not any local jurisdiction. The charges will be announced by the US Attorney’s Office in Manhattan today. Her testimony, if she chooses to reveal what she knows, could be very damaging to many people in powerful positions. Hopefully she will be better protected than Jeffrey Epstein was.

This Wasn’t Done By A Bedsheet

Yesterday The Gateway Pundit posted an article that included pictures of Jeffrey Epstein after he supposedly hung himself with a bed sheet. If you would like to see the pictures, please follow the link above–I am not including them here.

The neck wound in the photo appears to have been made by a very narrow object rather than a bed sheet that could not have been twisted tightly enough to make that mark.

The article reports:

In November famed pathologist Dr. Michael Baden went on FOX and Friends where he claimed evidence points to homicide over suicide in Jeffrey Epstein’s prison death.

It should be noted that Dr. Baden was hired by Epstein’s family to oversee the autopsy.

The article continues:

Dr. Baden also pointed to the three broken neck bones were “very unusual of suicide and more indicative of homicide strangulation.”

Dr. Baden is not the only top pathologist who said this. Dr. Cyril Wecht, a doctor and lawyer, told Kennedy on FOX Business Network in August a Montreal study found only 2 of 239 hanging death resulted in a broken Hyoid bone — or less than 1% of those killed.

…Dr. Baden also joined Judge Jeanine Pirro later that week where they discussed Jeffrey Epstein’s death.

During the discussion Judge Jeanine and Dr. Baden and showed convincing evidence that Epstein’s death was not a suicide.
Epstein’s bed was 5′ 6″.  tall.  Epstein was 4′ tall on his knees.  The noose was found tied to the bed at 3’6′. According to Dr. Baden the height of the tie would not bring enough force to break ANY bones let alone three bones in his neck.

Judge Jeanine: Now I want to be real clear. I want the viewers to understand. I’ve tried these intentional strangulation cases too. The breaking of the hyoid bone, the fracture of the two Thyroid cartilage, that means serious force on the neck. That you don’t normally get in a hanging. Especially in a hanging. I want the next screen guys. Here’s a bunk bed. The height is 5’6″. On his knees Epstein is 4′ tall. You now have been able to identify that the tie is right there (around 3′ 6″).

Dr. Baden: The ligature is tied up here (3’6″) but it’s down to the floor as far as the body goes. So there’s not enough force there to cause ANY fracture.

Judge Jeanine: Any fracture at all, let alone these fractures?

Dr. Baden: Right.

I am sure that this will not be the last we hear of this.

This Really Isn’t News To Anyone Who Has Been Paying Attention

The New York Post posted an article today about some recent comments by forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden, New York City’s former chief medical examiner, about the death of Jeffrey Epstein.

The article reports:

“I think that the evidence points toward homicide rather than suicide,” Baden insisted on Fox News Wednesday.

“The brother (Mark Epstein) is concerned that if [Epstein] was murdered, then other people who have information might be at risk,” Baden insisted, suggesting powerful players may have been involved in the death.

“If they think he has information, his life could be in jeopardy.”

Baden said there were signs of “unusual” activity “from day one” of the autopsy, saying the wounds were “more consistent with ligature homicidal strangulation.”

The article also notes some rather strange circumstances surrounding the death of Jeffrey Epstein:

Baden noted two fractures on either side of Epstein’s larynx, and one on the hyoid bone, above the moneyman’s Adam’s apple.

“Hanging does not cause these broken bones and homicide does,” he insisted on Fox. “A huge amount of pressure was applied.”

Baden also called for federal prosecutors to release the findings from DNA samples.

 “They took fingernail clippings to see if there’s anybody else’s DNA on it and that hasn’t been released, neither has information about whose DNA is on the ligature out of torn strips of orange sheets,” he said.

“Whoever made it has to have a lot of DNA on it and the brother has been asking for that from day one.”

He also questioned the supposed “total breakdown in security,” with the “extremely unlikely” coincidences of two guards falling asleep while video cameras in Epstein’s cell and hallway were also not working.

I suspect this is not the last we will hear about this. Hopefully the truth will be revealed eventually.

Scurrying For Cover

Jeffrey Epstein is dead. The debate over how he actually died will probably continue for a long time. Meanwhile, many of the ‘elites’ who attended his parties and spent time with him before his alleged activities came to light are attempting to distance themselves from him. Unfortunately, in the day of the Internet, pictures, and occasional investigative journalists, the attempts to deny being on Mr. Epstein’s guest list at his parties are not working well.

Yesterday The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article with the following headline, “Woody Allen is pictured leaving Jeffrey Epstein’s mansion after lavish party in Prince Andrew’s honor that was also attended by Katie Couric,Chelsea Handler and George Stephanopolous.” That’s an interesting group of people.

The article reports:

Seeking to put a lid on a scandal showing little sign of abating, the Duke of York coyly referred yesterday to his ‘former association or friendship’ with Jeffrey Epstein.

Those who attended a glittering party in the Duke’s honour on December 2, 2010, in New York might be surprised at his choice of words.

Not least because it was thrown by convicted paedophile Epstein himself at his Upper East Side mansion, variously dubbed the House of Horror and the House of Depravity by the banker’s young victims.

As The Mail on Sunday revealed last weekend, it was at this mansion where Andrew came to the door to wave goodbye to Katherine Keating, daughter of former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating, on the afternoon of December 6.

The article concludes:

The Prince has fiercely denied any wrongdoing and knowledge of Epstein’s crimes, but he has faced questions about how he could have missed a procession of beautiful young women visiting the mansion during his six-day stay.

‘There were girls coming and going the entire time Prince Andrew was inside the house,’ an eyewitness said.

‘It was happening in broad daylight. If the Prince didn’t see all the girls coming through that door, he was the only person on 71st Street who didn’t. It was flagrant.

‘At one point someone who looked like a royal protection officer came outside. Even if Andrew didn’t realise what was going on, you have to wonder why the people assigned to protect him didn’t say something?’

Many of Epstein’s victims have described how assaults took place in an upstairs massage room which was strictly off-limits to other house guests.

Some reports this week claimed Prince Andrew is now ‘fearful’ of returning to the US because he worries about being dragged into one of the multiple civil lawsuits being brought against Epstein’s £500 million estate. Lawyer Bradley Edwards, who represents several of the victims, said last night: ‘We would welcome the chance to speak to Prince Andrew under oath.’

Considering the charges against Jeffrey Epstein, he ran with an interesting crowd.

Will The Victims Receive Justice?

The death of Jeffrey Epstein was not the end of the story. Today Ed Morrissey posted an article at Hot Air about one of Epstein’s victims filing a lawsuit against Ghislaine Maxwell, described as one of Epstein’s enablers.

The article reports::

A new front in the Jeffrey Epstein case opened Wednesday morning, as Epstein accuser Jennifer Araoz filed a lawsuit against his estate, his longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell and three unnamed female household staff.

Araoz alleges she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by Epstein at his New York City townhouse when she was 14 and 15 years old, including a forcible rape in 2002. She first disclosed her alleged abuse publicly in an exclusive TODAY Show interview with Savannah Guthrie of NBC News on July 10, the same day she filed papers in New York state court saying she intended to sue Epstein.

The complaint Araoz filed Wednesday alleges Maxwell and the other staffers “conspired with each other to make possible and otherwise facilitate the sexual abuse and rape of Plaintiff.”

Meanwhile, The U.K. Daily Mail reported today:

Ghislaine Maxwell, long-time consort of Jeffrey Epstein and the alleged procurer of victims in his underage sex trafficking ring, has been laying low in a New England beach town, DailyMail.com has learned exclusively.

Maxwell, 57, is in a relationship with Scott Borgerson, 43, and has been living with him at his secluded oceanfront property at the end of a long private road in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts.

The British socialite has been loath to leave the $3 million mansion, a source told DailyMail.com amid heightened focus on Epstein’s alleged co-conspirators following the convicted pedophile’s apparent suicide on Saturday.

‘She’s become a real homebody, rarely ventures out. She’s the antithesis of the woman who traveled extensively and partied constantly with Epstein,’ said a source familiar with Maxwell’s new life.

Hot Air concludes:

Araoz explains her decision in today’s New York Times to press forward with her civil claims, not just against Epstein’s estate but also against his “adult enablers.” Without them, Epstein could never have succeeded in the scope of his predation, Araoz convincingly argues:

The power structure was stacked against me. His money, influence and connections to important people made me want to hide and stay silent. Those same powerful forces let him hide and evade justice.

That changes, starting now. I want my story to hold Epstein to account and also his recruiters, the workers on his payroll who knew what he was doing and the prominent people around him who helped conceal and perpetuate his sex-trafficking scheme. Their hideous actions victimized me and so many young girls like me. …

Standing up to the entrenched network of power and wealth that surrounded Epstein is scary, but I am no longer afraid. Reliving these experiences is tough, but I’ve learned to be tougher.

I used to feel alone, walking into his mansion with the cameras pointing at me, but now I have the power of the law on my side. I will be seen. I will be heard. I will demand justice.

So will others, especially now that Epstein’s dead and his “power structure” is on the run. Or at least the part of it that we know about at the moment. When other victims start adding some high-profile male names to this “power structure” in court documents, we’ll see how well the justice system works.

We are about to find out if there really is equal justice under the law

Hoping For Justice

The following video was posted at YouTube today:

I hope what Attorney General Barr says is true. There were obviously many people involved in the escapades of Jeffrey Epstein. All of those people need to go to jail. I am hoping they found enough evidence in Jeffrey Epstein’s safe in New York City to send those people to jail. Human trafficking is a horrible thing. Exploiting young girls is something that should result in jail time. Time will tell if justice will actually be done.

More Questions Than Answers

On Saturday, Jeffrey Epstein, an inmate at Metropolitan Correction Center in lower Manhattan, was found unresponsive in his cell. He was taken to the hospital where he was declared dead. There are a lot of questions surrounding these events. There are very few answers available.

The New York Post reported yesterday:

The following account is from a former inmate of the Metropolitan Correction Center in lower Manhattan, where Jeffrey Epstein was found unresponsive Saturday, and declared dead at a hospital of an apparent suicide. The ex-convict, who spoke to The Post’s Brad Hamilton and Bruce Golding on the condition of anonymity, spent several months in the 9 South special housing unit for high-profile prisoners awaiting trial — like Epstein.

There’s no way that man could have killed himself. I’ve done too much time in those units. It’s an impossibility.

Between the floor and the ceiling is like eight or nine feet. There’s no way for you to connect to anything.

You have sheets, but they’re paper level, not strong enough. He was 200 pounds — it would never happen.

When you’re on suicide watch, they put you in this white smock, a straight jacket. They know a person cannot be injurious to themselves.

…But it’s my firm belief that Jeffrey Epstein did not commit suicide. It just didn’t happen.

Breitbart reported yesterday:

Rudy Giuliani reacted to Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged suicide Saturday morning, asking a series of questions about his death and stating, “Committing suicide on suicide watch doesn’t happen.”

Authorities found the convicted pedophile dead in his cell early Saturday morning, according to several reports.

Epstein committed suicide via hanging, according to reports from the New York Times and ABC News. The Associated Press reported that the “medical examiner’s office in Manhattan confirmed Epstein’s death.”

Many, including Giuliani, have questions.

“What does the word suicide mean in the phrase suicide WATCH? Who was watching? Did they fall asleep? Did the camera malfunction? Was there camera surveillance? Who was he about to implicate?” Giuliani tweeted Saturday.

Yesterday Bernie Kerik, former first deputy and commissioner of the New York City Department of Corrections and former commissioner of the New York (City) Police Department, posted an article at The Hill about the death of Jeffrey Epstein.

Commissioner Kerik notes:

The crime here — in my mind, with what is known at this point — is that Epstein was placed in solitary confinement at all. The government often uses every tool in its power to ensure you never have a fair day’s fight in court, including the use of psychological tools to force you to plead guilty or to force you to cooperate with the government.

Solitary confinement is one of those tools. It is a mechanism to demean, degrade and demoralize a prisoner. The mind-altering seclusion of “solitary” will force a prisoner into a deep depression from which, for some, there is no return.

Only time will tell if that’s what happened with Epstein or if something more sinister occurred.

But one thing already is crystal clear: There are flaws and failures in the U.S. criminal justice system that should disturb all of us. And in Jeffrey Epstein’s case, none of it makes any sense.

Right now we have questions, not answers. Hopefully in the future we will get some answers.

Wondering If This Will Actually Happen

The Washington Examiner posted an article today about the negotiations surrounding the trial of Jeffrey Epstein.

The article reports:

Jet-setting financier and convicted sex offender Jeffery Epstein’s trial on child sex trafficking charges won’t start until next June, at the earliest.

Federal prosecutors clashed with lawyers representing the jet-setting financier Wednesday over when the trial should begin, with the government arguing it should kick off next June, while the defense advocated for a post-Labor Day 2020 start date.

The judge didn’t make a definitive ruling, though he said June 2020 is the earliest the high-profile trial, expected to last four to six weeks, would commence.

Martin Weinberg, one of Epstein’s attorneys, claimed that the defense had one million pages of discovery to wade through and argued that a September 2020 trial date would be preferable because “thirteen months sounds like the appropriate amount of time it takes to prepare a case of this magnitude.”

A federal prosecutor countered that the trial should start sooner than that, telling the judge that a delay is not in the public interest and arguing that Epstein should be tried as “swiftly as possible.”

Judge Richard Berman, who finds himself in the national and international spotlight while presiding over this case, hinted the trial might begin around June 8, 2020, but said he’d revisit the exact timing of the Epstein trial in the future.

There are a lot of people who do not want to see this trial take place. Many of them are in very powerful positions in our government. In my mind there is a real question as to whether Jeffrey Epstein will survive in prison long enough to be tried. Prisoners are not known for their compassionate treatment of men who sexually assault underage girls. There are also a lot of famous people who visited his island–some on a fairly regular basis.

Stay tuned.

Finding The Truth In The Epstein Investigation

The Wall Street Journal is reporting today that federal prosecutors have served grand jury subpoenas on Jeffrey Epstein’s personal pilots.

The article reports:

Testimony from the pilots could be used by federal investigators in their efforts to corroborate accounts from Mr. Epstein’s accusers. They could also provide detail on Mr. Epstein’s travels and his associates. Some of the pilots were responsible for keeping flight logs of passengers who flew on Mr. Epstein’s private jet, according to court filings.

Mr. Epstein, who was denied bail and will remain in federal custody pending trial, has pleaded not guilty to sex-trafficking charges stemming from what prosecutors allege was a yearslong scheme from 2002 to 2005 to recruit and sexually abuse dozens of girls.

Mr. Epstein’s lawyers didn’t respond to a request for comment. A spokesman for the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment.

In a recent court filing, prosecutors said that entities controlled by Mr. Epstein own at least two private jets in active service, and that at least one of them is capable of traveling internationally. He frequently traveled by private jet between his homes in New York and Palm Beach, Fla., according to the indictment against him. Mr. Epstein’s lawyers said he owns one private jet and sold the other one last month.

Women in civil lawsuits have accused Mr. Epstein of conspiring with his pilots and other associates from at least 1998 to 2002 to facilitate sex abuse and avoid law-enforcement detection. One woman has said in court filings that when she was a minor in 2000, Mr. Epstein transported her regularly on his private jet to be sexually exploited by his associates and friends.

If even one tenth of what Jeffrey Epstein is accused of is true, he needs to spend the rest of his life in jail. However, even Jeffrey Epstein is innocent until proven guilty. The best outcome of this investigation is that justice will be based on truth.

Would You Really Trust This Person Out On Bail?

Yesterday CNBC posted an article about Jeffrey Epstein’s lawyers negotiating bail for their client. Jeffrey Epstein is willing to post bail as high as $100 million. Would you take that deal?

The article notes a few things that might cause someone to hesitate before agreeing to the deal:

“We know they have found photos of young women in his home,” Farmer (Annie Farmer, one of his accusers) noted, referring to what prosecutors have said was a “vast trove” of lewd photos of young women or girls that investigators discovered in Epstein’s New York residence.

Before the accusers spoke, Assistant U.S. Attorney Alex Rossmiller said that a number of other witnesses contacted authorities after Epstein was recently indicted, and that prosecutors are trying to corroborate their allegations against him.

Rossmiller also revealed that investigators found in Epstein’s $77 million Manhattan townhouse a locked safe containing “piles of cash” and “dozens of diamonds,” as well as an expired passport dating to the 1980s from another country that has Epstein’s photograph on it — but with a different name and a stated residence of Saudi Arabia.

Rossmiller also said that “many, many photographs” of young-looking girls were found in the safe, and that the prosecutors have identified at least one person among them who claims to be a victim of Epstein’s.

Fake passports, diamonds, piles of cash…would you trust this person out on bail?

How Do You Reconcile This?

The Associated Press posted an article today about a recent fund raiser held by Kamala Harris. The fund raiser was hosted by was hosted by six partners of the law firm Kirkland and Ellis.

The article reports:

Kamala Harris bemoaned the influence of the powerful and connected elite last Tuesday when she called on top Justice Department officials to recuse themselves from any matter related to Jeffrey Epstein. She said their former law firm’s work on behalf of the financier accused of sexual abuse “calls into question the integrity of our legal system.”

Yet the same day, Harris’ husband headlined a Chicago fundraiser for her presidential campaign that was hosted by six partners of that firm — Kirkland and Ellis, according to an invitation obtained by The Associated Press.

…”If any connection with Kirkland and Ellis is a stain on (senior Justice Department officials), why isn’t a connection with the law firm for the receipt of campaign contributions a stain on her own campaign?” said Paul S. Ryan, an attorney for the good-government group Common Cause.

Ian Sams, a Harris spokesman, said there wasn’t a problem with accepting the campaign contributions because the firm is big and the partners who hosted the fundraiser didn’t work on Epstein’s plea agreement.

“The people involved in that case have not supported her campaign, and she wouldn’t want that support anyway,” Sams said.

This explanation represents some of the best doublespeak I have heard recently.

Some Disturbing Thoughts On The Jeffrey Epstein Case

Yesterday Andrew McCarthy posted an article at The National Review about the Jeffrey Epstein case. Andrew McCarthy is the former Chief Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York who led the terrorism prosecution against the “Blind Sheikh” (Omar Abdel Rahman) and eleven other jihadists for conducting a war of urban terrorism against the United States that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a plot to bomb New York City landmarks. He served as a prosecutor for 20 years. He has testified before Congress as an expert on issues of constitutional law, counterterrorism, and law-enforcement.

Below are some of his observations about the case against Jeffrey Epstein:

On Monday, Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that his office has now charged Epstein. While the SDNY indictment may be new, Epstein’s crimes are not. They are the same offenses from which Acosta agreed to spare Epstein from federal prosecution if he pled guilty to state prostitution charges — which Epstein proceeded to do, in reliance on Acosta’s commitment. There is thus a very good chance, based on the Constitution’s guarantee against double jeopardy, that the SDNY case against Epstein will be voided by the SD-Florida non-prosecution agreement (non-pros).

To be sure, the SDNY has a counterargument, and it will be vigorously made. It has two components. First, there is language in the non-pros that appears to limit the agreement to SD-Florida, to wit: “prosecution in this District for these offenses shall be deferred in favor of prosecution by the State of Florida” (emphasis added). Here, “deferred” effectively means forfeited — the same effect for double-jeopardy purposes as a conviction or acquittal — because of Epstein’s compliance with the requirement that he plead guilty in the state case. Second, there is jurisprudence in the Second Circuit (which controls in the SDNY) holding that one federal district’s agreement does not bind another.

Therefore, prosecutors will argue that the 2007 SD-Florida non-pros does not bar a 2019 SDNY indictment arising out of the same conduct and charging the same offenses.

I’m skeptical . . . and I think the SDNY is, too, notwithstanding the brave face prosecutors put on this week. They have carefully drafted an indictment far narrower than the SD-Florida’s contemplated case. If prosecutors really believed that there was no double-jeopardy problem, they’d have no such hesitation: They’d throw everything the FBI ever had at this sociopath. They know they are on thin ice.

Mr. McCarthy’s evaluation of the situation is not encouraging. I hope he is wrong, but his history and knowledge suggest he is probably right.

Please read the entire article to see the full argument. It would be a shame if this sleazeball escaped justice twice. I know he is innocent until proven guilty, but he has already been proven guilty–he just didn’t have to pay any real price for his horrific behavior.

 

A Question That Should Have Been Asked Long Ago

According to Michelle Clarier.com:

Michelle Celarier is an award-winning journalist who writes about the world of money and power for New York magazine, Fortune magazine, Institutional Investor, Worth and Slate. She has reported on hedge funds and the men who run them for over a decade, including a four-year stint as a tabloid scribe with the New York Post. She was previously the editor of Absolute Return and its successor Absolute Return + Alpha (AR), which won several magazine awards under her leadership.

Ms. Celarier recently posted an article at New York magazine about Jeffery Epstein.

The article notes:

Long before Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to prostitution charges in Florida more than a decade ago, his fellow Palm Beach resident and hedge-fund manager Douglas Kass was intrigued by the local gossip about his neighbor.

“I’m hearing about the parties, hearing about a guy who’s throwing money around,” says Kass, president of Seabreeze Partners Management. While stories about young girls swarming Epstein’s waterfront mansion and the sex parties he hosted for the rich and powerful were the talk of the town, Kass was more focused on how this obscure person, rumored to be managing billions of dollars, had become so wealthy without much of a track record.

Kass was well-connected on Wall Street, where he’d worked for decades, so he began to ask around. “I went to my institutional brokers, to their trading desks and asked if they ever traded with him. I did it a few times until the date when he was arrested,” he recalls. “Not one institutional trading desk, primary or secondary, had ever traded with Epstein’s firm.”

When a reporter came to interview Kass about Bernie Madoff shortly before that firm blew up in the biggest Ponzi scheme ever, Kass told her, “There’s another guy who reminds me of Madoff that no one trades with.” That man was Jeffrey Epstein.

“How did he get the money?” Kass kept asking.

For decades, Epstein has been credulously described as a big-time hedge-fund manager and a billionaire, even though there’s not a lot of evidence that he is either. There appears little chance the public is going to get definitive answers anytime soon. In a July 11 letter to the New York federal judge overseeing Epstein’s sex-trafficking case, Epstein’s attorney offered to provide “sealed disclosures” about Epstein’s finances to determine the size of the bond he would need to post to secure his release from jail pending trial. His brother, Mark, and a friend even offered to chip in, if necessary.

The article notes some unusual things about Jeffery Epstein’s investment success:

To begin with, there is much skepticism among the hedgies Intelligencer spoke with that Epstein made the money he has — and he appears to have a lot, given a lavish portfolio of homes and private aircraft — as a traditional money manager. A fund manager who knows well how that kind of fortune is acquired notes, “It’s hard to make a billion dollars quietly.” Epstein never made a peep in the financial world.

Epstein was also missing another key element of a typical thriving hedge fund: investors. Kass couldn’t find any beyond Epstein’s one well-publicized client, retail magnate Les Wexner — nor could other players in the hedge-fund world who undertook similar snooping. “I don’t know anyone who’s ever invested in him; he’s never talked about by any of the allocators,” says one billionaire hedge-fund manager, referring to firms that distribute large pools money among various funds.

The article notes one very believable theory on how Jeffrey Epstein became a billionaire:

Given this puzzling set of data points, the hedge-fund managers we spoke to leaned toward the theory that Epstein was running a blackmail scheme under the cover of a hedge fund.

How such a scheme could hypothetically work has been laid out in detail in a thread on the anonymous Twitter feed of @quantian1. It’s worth reading in its entirety, but in summary it is a rough blueprint for how a devious aspiring hedge-fund manager could blackmail rich people into investing with him without raising too many flags.

Kass and former hedge-fund manager Whitney Tilson both emailed the thread around in investing circles and both quickly discovered that their colleagues found it quite convincing. “This actually sounds very plausible,” Tilson wrote in an email forwarding the thread to others.

“He somehow cajoled these guys to invest,” says Kass, speaking of hypothetical blackmailed investors who gave Epstein their money to invest, but managed to keep their names private.

The fact that Epstein’s fund is offshore in a tax haven — it is based in the U.S. Virgin Islands — and has a secret client list both add credence to the blackmail theory.

The article concludes:

In the 2015 filing, Giuffre claimed that Epstein “debriefed her” after she was forced into sexual encounters so that he could possess “intimate and potentially embarrassing information” to blackmail friends into parking their money with him. She also said photographic and video evidence existed — an assertion that looms especially large now that federal investigators have found a trove of images in Epstein’s home safe.

There are other theories about how Epstein made his money–a Ponzi scheme, work for the intelligence community, money laundering, and offshore tax schemes. Now that Epstein’s New York City residence has been cleared of evidence by authorities, it will be interesting to see who is involved in his financial dealings (and other activities).

Why Didn’t The New York City Police Department Follow The Law?

Yesterday The New York Post reported that Jeffrey Epstein, after being labeled a Level 3 sex offender in 2011, never once checked in with city cops in the eight-plus years since a Manhattan judge ordered him to do so every 90 days — and the NYPD says it’s fine with that. What?

The article reports:

After being labeled a worst-of-the-worst, Level 3 sex offender in 2011, Epstein should have reported in person to verify his address 34 times before he was arrested Saturday on federal child sex-trafficking charges.

Violating requirements of the state’s 1996 Sex Offender Registration Act — including checking in with law enforcement — is a felony punishable by up to four years in prison for a first offense.

Subsequent violations carry a sentence of up to seven years each.

But the NYPD hasn’t required the billionaire financier — who owns a $77 million Upper East Side townhouse — to check in since he registered as a sex offender in New York over the controversial 2008 plea bargain he struck in Florida amid allegations he sexually abused scores of underage girls in his Palm Beach mansion.

Michael Bloomberg was the Mayor of New York in 2011. In 2014, Bill de Blasio became Mayor. Did they make this decision or did the police chief make this decision?

The article continues:

That was the same hearing where, in a highly controversial move, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office tried to argue on Epstein’s behalf that he should be deemed a low-risk Level 1 offender, which would have exempted him from the reporting requirements.

The DA’s office has said that the prosecutor in that case — Jennifer Gaffney, who quit last year — “made a mistake” and that DA Cyrus Vance Jr. was unaware of it at the time.

In March, an NYPD spokeswoman told the Washington Post that Epstein never checked in following Pickholz’s ruling. Asked repeatedly about that admission this week, the NYPD declined comment.

Asked about her ruling, state court spokesman Lucian Chalfen said Pickholz “stands by what was said in court, on the record, at the hearing and has had no further role in any type of enforcement. That’s not the court’s role.”

In addition to verifying a sex offender’s address, the 90-day check-ins allow cops to take a new photograph if the offender’s appearance has changed, so it can be updated online.

The NYPD cop assigned to monitor Epstein has repeatedly complained to Vance’s Sex Crimes Unit that Epstein wasn’t in compliance, according to a source familiar with the matter.

But prosecutors told the cop to merely send Epstein a letter reminding him of his reporting requirement.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It is fascinating. One wonders how much money changed hands and to whose hands it went to keep this man from having the meet his legal responsibilities in New York City.

Bringing Justice In The Midst Of A Tangled Web

On Wednesday, Forbes posted an article about financier Jeffrey Epstein. Mr. Epstein was charged with sex crimes in Florida and avoided trial with a plea deal that seemed very lenient for the charges involved. He was arrested Saturday in New York City and charged with sex trafficking minors. He is expected to appear in court in New York on Monday.

The article reports:

A federal appeals court Wednesday ordered that 167 documents in a lawsuit that alleges famously well-connected financier Jeffrey Epstein participated in a sex-trafficking ring should be unsealed—and that many of his powerful friends could be named.

  • In its 27-page decision, the court cited the public’s right to access the case information outweighed the privacy of certain individuals, “including numerous prominent American politicians, powerful business executives, foreign presidents, a well‐known Prime Minister, and other world leaders.” 
  • Virginia Guiffre (now Roberts) filed the lawsuit against Ghislane Maxwell, alleging that she had used her as part of a sex trafficking network of underage girls to Epstein and a number of his famous friends, including his lawyer Alan Dershowitz and Prince Andrew. Both men denied the accusations.
  • Dershowitz has supported unsealing the documents, according to the Daily Beast.
  • The documents will not be immediately available, as anonymous individuals involved in the case have two weeks to file appeals.
  • The court advised the documents be read carefully. “We therefore urge the media to exercise restraint in covering potentially defamatory allegations, and we caution the public to read such accounts with discernment,” wrote the court in its decision.

In January 2015, The U.K. Daily Mail posted some of the flight logs from the “Lolita Express’ (the nickname of Epstein’s airplane that he used to transport people and underage girls to his private island. Please follow the link to the article to read the names. Because of those names, I would be very surprised if the court documents are actually unsealed. Mr. Epstein had connections in high places, which allowed him to avoid the punishment in Florida that an ordinary person would have received. It will be interesting to see if he has those same connections in New York City.

 

The Epstein Case Gets Murkier

Mike Cernovich is reporting that the mystery man who filed the brief to keep the records sealed in the Jeffrey Epstein case formerly worked for Robert Mueller and James Comey.

The article reports:

A mystery man with massive wealth and power retained a powerful law firm to keep the records sealed in a case involving Jeffrey Epstein. (See Politico here, and the Miami Herald’s report here.)

After the Second Circuit Court Court of Appeals, in a lawsuit involving investigative Julie Brown of the Miami Herald and others, signaled it was prepared to order an entire vault of records unsealed, the mystery man made the unusual move of filing what’s known as an amicus curiae brief anonymously. Latin for “friend of the court,” an amicus curiae brief is only supposed to be filed when the brief will help the Court reach a proper conclusion of law.

Seeking to bypass ordinary judicial procedure with high-powered lawyers, the mystery man filed a brief that would only benefit himself, and called it an amicus brief.

The Miami Herald’s lawyers properly called out this outrageous move, which would get an ordinary lawyer sanctioned for abuse of the judicial process:

  • “As a preliminary matter, John Doe’s proposed amicus brief is an improper vehicle by which to submit his arguments. See United States v. Gotti, noting that the phrase amicus curiae means, literally, ‘friend of the court,’ and ‘serv[es] for the benefit of the court and for the purpose of assisting the court in cases of general public interest’….”
  • “John Doe is admittedly self-interested in seeking closure.”

Evidently there are some very important people who engaged in some very awful activities and don’t want what they did revealed. If what they were involved in was illegal (as it appears to be), their activities need to be revealed and the appropriate justice applied.

This Could Get Very Ugly

There are a lot of questions about how the Jeffrey Epstein trial and sentencing was handled in Florida. A lot of evidence has remained secret, and a lot of circumstantial evidence seems to require a much harsher sentence than was given. The Miami Herald has followed this story and done a lot of investigative reporting on the case.

Yesterday The Miami Herald posted an article about the latest twist in the Jeffrey Epstein case.

The article reports:

Two mysterious parties, labeling themselves Jane Doe and John Doe, have filed separate legal briefs in an attempt to limit the public release of personal information that could connect them to an underage sex trafficking operation allegedly run by New York financier Jeffrey Epstein and his partner, Ghislaine Maxwell.

Jane Doe, represented by Kerrie Campbell, a Washington-based gender equality lawyer, appears to be a victim who wants to remain unidentified, but indicated she is amicable to the release of some information — as long as it doesn’t identify her, court documents filed this week show.

The other party, John Doe, submitted a brief in support of Maxwell, who continues to mount a last-ditch legal campaign to keep court records that allegedly contain details of their sex exploits involving young girls — and other third party people who may be involved — under seal.

It’s not clear whether the latest challenges will delay release of the documents, said Sanford Bohrer, attorney for the Miami Herald, which filed an action to unseal the files last year as part of its investigation into Epstein called “Perversion of Justice.’’

The article concludes:

Epstein, who was not party to the lawsuit, has denied he ever ran a sex trafficking operation. In 2005, he came under investigation by Palm Beach police, accused of molesting three dozen underage girls by luring them to his mansion under the guise of paying them for massages.

Eventually, under a secret plea deal negotiated by then-Miami U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta, Epstein pleaded guilty to two prostitution charges in state court and served 13 months in the county jail, where he enjoyed liberal work release privileges despite that being prohibited for sex offenders.

In November, the Miami Herald published a series of articles that deconstructed how Epstein and his lawyers manipulated the criminal justice system, working secretly with federal prosecutors to conceal and minimize his crimes. The handling of the case is now under investigation by the Department of Justice.

On March 4, some of Epstein’s lawyers wrote an op-ed letter to The New York Times denying that Epstein ran a sex trafficking ring and contending that the number of women involved in his criminal case was “vastly exaggerated.’’

Acosta, who is now President Trump’s secretary of labor, has come under pressure by some in Congress to resign his post, but the president on Tuesday expressed his support.

This is a story to keep an eye on. There are a lot of people involved in the Epstein story who would very much like to keep their names secret. We know a lot of their names because some of the flight logs of the plane to “Lolita Island” have been released. If more of the records regarding the Epstein trial are made public, there are a number of public figures who will have a lot of explaining to do.

This Could Take Some Very Interesting Turns

This article is based on two articles posted yesterday–one in The New York Post and one at Fox News.

The New York Post reports:

The Justice Department has opened an investigation into its own possible misconduct in the wrist-slap prosecution of multimillionaire serial pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

The investigation is being conducted by the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, according to MSNBC.

“OPR has now opened an investigation into allegations that Department attorneys may have committed professional misconduct in the manner in which the Epstein criminal matter was resolved,” Assistant Attorney General Stephen E. Boyd said in a Feb. 6 letter to Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.).

“OPR will thoroughly investigate the allegations of misconduct that have been raised and, consistent with its practice, will share its results with you at the conclusion of its investigation as appropriate,” he wrote.

Sasse, a member of the Judiciary Committee, had asked last month for an investigation into Justice’s treatment of Epstein, citing a Miami Herald series on the pervy hedge fund manager’s crimes and the sweetheart deal that let him off the hook.

Senator Sasse has a reputation as someone who opposes President Trump.

Fox News reports:

The Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) has opened an investigation into a generous plea bargain awarded in 2007 by a top Florida prosecutor — who now serves as President Trump’s secretary of labor — to a wealthy, Clinton-connected financier and sex offender accused of abusing underage sex slaves.

…Alexander Acosta negotiated what critics are calling a sweetheart, potentially corrupt plea deal with Jeffrey Epstein when he was the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida. The arrangement required Epstein to pay restitution to dozens of victims, but offered a variety of unusual concessions as part of a non-prosecution agreement.

So let’s back up and look at this for a minute. Jeffrey Epstein was (and is) very well connected politically. Bill Clinton is directly involved in this scandal–there are records of him flying to Epstein’s island on Epstein’s plane. However, the Clintons have lost a lot of their political sway in the past two years. It is quite possible that this investigation will snare Bill Clinton, but it will also make President Trump look bad because he appointed Alexander Acosta as Secretary of Labor. For a never-Trumper like Senator Sasse, it’s a win-win situation–the Republicans get Bill Clinton and he gets President Trump.

The matter did come up during Alexander Acosta’s confirmation hearing.

Fox News reports:

In 2017, Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine asked Acosta about the plea deal during his confirmation hearings.

“Why cut a non-prosecution deal despite your staff saying you shouldn’t?” Kaine asked.

“That is not accurate,” Acosta, who at the time was dean of Florida International University’s law school, responded. ““It was a broadly-held decision. … The grand jury recommended a single count of solicitation not involving minors. That would have resulted in zero jail time, zero registration as a sexual offender and zero restitution for the victims in this case.”

Instead, Acosta said, he pushed to escalate Epstein’s case to the federal level, even as he recognized that proving all of the allegations against him would be difficult.

“It was highly unusual where a U.S. attorney becomes involved in a matter that has already gone to the grand jury at the state level,” Acosta told senators. “We decided that Mr. Epstein should plead guilty to two years, register as a sexual offender, and concede liability so the victims should get restitution in this matter.”

Asked about keeping the deal confidential, Acosta suggested that he was following common practice.

Jeffrey Epstein’s sentence was a joke. The Department of Justice should investigate it. However, considering some of the bias shown in the recent actions of the Department of Justice, I have no idea what to expect.

This Could Get Very Ugly Very Fast

The American Thinker posted a story today about a court filing on the last day of 2015 that could have a significant impact on the presidential campaign.

The article reports:

Federal prosecutors in Florida intentionally kept underage victims of billionaire perv Jeffrey Epstein in the dark about his plea deal, newly unsealed court papers reveal.

The documents also show prosecutors wanted to keep the extent of Epstein’s alleged sex crimes away from a judge reviewing the deal.

“I will include our standard language regarding resolving all criminal liability and I will mention ‘co-conspirators,’ but I would prefer not to highlight for the judge all of the other crimes and all of the other persons that we could charge,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Marie Villafana wrote to one Epstein lawyer in September 2007.

Another email shows she agreed to stop sending notifications about the non-prosecution deal to 34 underage girls Epstein allegedly sexually preyed upon after his lawyers complained.

The feds say they struck the deal in return for Epstein pleading to state charges involving a single victim. 

…This plea involved the slap on the wrist sentence of 13 months — and he got to spend his waking hours at his Palm Beach mansion. That is, he only had to check into his “jail” eight hours a day.

The Palm Beach Daily News is taking another look at this story. On January 1st, they reported the following:

Two underage victims of Palm Beach billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have filed court papers asking to depose top federal officials who were involved in inking the secret deal that saved Epstein from serious federal charges.

FBI agents, current and former federal prosecutors, and Alexander Acosta, the former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, are named in the motion filed by attorneys Brad Edwards and Paul Cassell on behalf of Jane Doe No. 1 and Jane Doe No. 2. The girls were 14 and 13, respectively, at the time of the sex abuse.

The victims filed the motion, in part, because of a new argument Assistant U.S. Attorney Dexter Lee made during a routine status check hearing in November.

Lee said the girls aren’t really victims because they procured other minor girls for Epstein and received money for it so they’re not protected under the federal Crime Victims’ Rights Act.

“Apparently, the government believes that because Epstein pressured some of his young victims into performing sexual acts, those victims themselves were complicit in Epstein’s crimes and, therefore, are barred from seeking relief under the CVRA,” the motion says. “There has never been any public document (or other private document that we have seen) in this or any related case that has ‘accused’ Epstein’s young victims of committing ‘the crime’ that Epstein committed.”

It is very obvious that Epstein’s punishment does not fit the crime. The question is, “Why?” Because Bill Clinton was (or is) a close friend of Epstein, there is a fairly strong possibility that if this case and sentence are seriously investigated, Bill Clinton could be implicated. Stay tuned. Despite the fact that most of the media is ignoring this story, it may not go away, and it may have serious consequences.