Summary: In the 20th century, mystery novels described mysterious deaths that were convenient for the rich and powerful. In 21st Century America, the newspapers report them. Then and now, we can only guess about the guilty – or if there was even a crime. I’ll bet that we will never know for sure – any more than we know who killed JFK. Here is what we know, cutting through the misinformation.
For three decades, many people have accused Jeffrey Epstein of crimes. But although prosecutors and victims tried to hold Jeffrey Epstein to account, at every turn, he slipped away. In a 2008 plea deal, he admitted to state charges of solicitation of prostitution from a minor. The deal was negotiated with then-U.S. attorney and former Trump Cabinet member Alexander Acosta. Epstein was sentenced to 13 months in jail but was allowed to leave the jail for 12 hours a day, six days a week, to work at his office in Florida. Epstein’s case was reopened after a Miami Herald investigation last year brought this into the light.
Epstein himself is a mystery, especially about his money. None of the stories make much sense. The NYT: “Mystery Around Jeffrey Epstein’s Fortune and How He Made It.” Bloomberg: “Mystery Around Jeffrey Epstein’s Fortune and How He Made It.” For speculation, see “How Jeffrey Epstein Made His Money: Four Wild Theories” at NY Magazine
Now Epstein is dead …
Epstein died before he could tell police about the involvement of rich and powerful people in his festivities. There are probably lots of corks popping today! See the details in this NBC News summary. Note that neither of Epstein’s “suicide” attempts has been definitively classified as a suicide.
“Epstein, 66, was placed on suicide watch after he was found passed out in his jail cell with marks on his neck inside the Metropolitan Correctional Center on July 23 ….
“Even before his first suspected suicide try last month, Jeffrey Epstein was perhaps the most vulnerable man in the federal jail system: a wealthy and well-known financier accused of sexually abusing dozens of underage girls. He was, by all accounts, the kind of inmate that should have been under the closest possible supervision.
“Instead, Epstein was taken off suicide watch {on July 29} before he apparently took his own life, officials told NBC News, a decision that baffled former wardens and veterans of the federal prison system.
“‘For them to pull him off suicide watch is shocking,’ Cameron Lindsay, a former warden who worked at three federal facilities, told NBC News. ‘For someone this high-profile, with these allegations and this many victims, who has had a suicide attempt in the last few weeks, you can take absolutely no chances. You leave him on suicide watch until he’s out of there.’ …
“One federal prison official with knowledge of the incident confirmed Mr. Epstein …was being held alone in a cell in a special housing unit. The official …said guards found Mr. Epstein in an otherwise empty cell during morning rounds. …Inmates on suicide watch are generally placed in a special observation cell, surrounded with windows, with a bolted down bed and no bedclothes, the official said. A correction officer – or sometimes a fellow inmate trained to be a ‘suicide companion’ – is typically assigned to sit in an adjacent office and monitor the inmate constantly.
“Robert Gangi, an expert on prisons and the former executive director of the Correctional Association of New York, said guards also generally take shoelaces and belts away from people on suicide watch. ‘It’s virtually impossible to kill yourself,’ Mr. Gangi said.
“Inmates can only be removed from the watch when the program coordinator, who is generally the chief psychologist at the facility, deems they are no longer at imminent risk for suicide, according to a 2007 Bureau of Prison document outlining suicide prevention policies. The inmates cannot be removed from the watch without a face-to-face psychological evaluation.
“To take an inmate off suicide watch, a ‘post-watch report’ needs to be completed, which includes an analysis of how the inmate’s circumstances have changed and why that merits removal from the watch, the document said.”
Immediately afterward, there were edits cleaning up Epstein’s Wikipedia page. Despite rumors, Google did not suppress photos of Epstein and Bill Clinton.
An exposé in The Daily Mail.
Of course, that The Daily Mail prints something does not mean it is true. Just plausible.
“Jeffrey Epstein told prison guards and fellow inmates that he believed someone had tried to kill him in the weeks before his death, a source has revealed to DailyMail. The insider, who had seen the disgraced financier on several occasions during his incarceration at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, also claims that the normally reserved Epstein seemed to be in good spirits. ‘There was no indication that he might try to take his own life,’ the source told DailyMail.”
The sex-ring investigation continues.
See the press release by Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman. The last sentence reminds us that the indictment of Epstein implies a conspiracy, and so there are co-conspirators yet to be indicted.
“To those brave young women who have already come forward and to the many others who have yet to do so, let me reiterate that we remain committed to standing for you, and our investigation of the conduct charged in the Indictment – which included a conspiracy count – remains ongoing.”
Updates
The NYT reports that Bureau of Prisons procedures required that Epstein have a cellmate and be checked by guards every 30 minutes. The BoP assured the Justice Department that these procedures would be followed. But Epstein’s cellmate was transferred out of the unit, living him alone. Guards did not check him regularly. Also, they are not releasing the autopsy results at this time.
NBC News reports that “New York City’s chief medical examiner released a statement Sunday evening saying an autopsy has been performed on Epstein, but that more information is needed before a cause of death determination is made.” Also, “Guards on Jeffrey Epstein’s unit were working extreme overtime shifts to make up for staffing shortages the morning of his apparent suicide.”
Some harsh comments about Epstein’s “suicide.”
if you’re surprised that jeffrey epstein killed himself last night, imagine how surprised he must have been
— hell (@swearsayer) August 10, 2019
If the Epstein thing occurred in Russia — “oligarch” with connections to the ruling political elite found dead under suspicious circumstances — it would automatically get cast by US media as evidence of how fundamentally corrupt Russian society is
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) August 10, 2019
How would we perceive the Epstein story if it happened in China, Russia or even Mexico?
Well that’s how it looks to the rest of the world right now. We should let that sink in
— mark safranski (@zenpundit) August 10, 2019
If we were living in a paranoid fantasy universe, I would be very suspicious about the Epstein suicide, even about whether it was really suicide. And you know what? The Epstein case itself shows that we *are* kind of living in a paranoid fantasy universe
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) August 10, 2019
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Books revealing the Deep State
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The American Deep State: Big Money, Big Oil, and the Struggle for U.S. Democracy
