I’m a corrections officer. This should never have been possible. During the intake process due to the nature of his crimes and being famous he should have already been on special watch. Then after the first attempt he would have been in a special cell. He would be in what we call a “pickle suit” it’s a green suit that you can’t tear or tie to anything. His blankets would be the same material. He would only get hygiene products under supervision. Only thing allowed in his cell would be a book and court papers. Then we would be monitored more closely. This is a huge failing on the jail. I want a massive investigation on how this was able to happen.

Epstein from 2000 to 2002, expands on her previous allegations, in court filings and tabloids, that she was forced to have sex with the U.K.’s Prince Andrew and Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz. Both men have strenuously denied those allegations. -Bloomberg

He was arrested on July 6 at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey on charges of sex-trafficking minors and subsequently denied bail.

Meanwhile, Epstein’s personal pilots had been subpoenaed by federal prosecutors in Manhattan last month, which could be used to corroborate accounts from Epstein’s accusers, as well as his travels and associates.

A conveniently timed sale

While prosecutors claimed that Epstein owns two private jets, the registered sex offender’s attorneys said in a court filing earlier this month that he owns one private jet, and “sold the other jet in June 2019.” Considering that he was arrested after returning from Paris in his Gulfstream G550, per Bloomberg, it suggests that Epstein sold his infamous and evidence-rich Boeing 272-200 known as the “Lolita Express” weeks before his arrest.

According to flight logs, former President Bill Clinton flew on the “Lolita Express” a total of 27 times. “Many of those times Clinton had his Secret Service with him and many times he did not,” according to investigative journalist Conchita Sarnoff – who first revealed the former president’s extensive flights on Epstein’s “lolita express” in a 2010 Daily Beast exposé.

Clinton claimed in a July statement that he only took “a total of four trips on Jeffrey Epstein’s airplane” in 2002 and 2003, and that Secret Service accompanied him at all times – which Sarnoff told Fox News was a total lie.

“I know from the pilot logs and these are pilot logs that you know were written by different pilots and at different times that Clinton went, he was a guest of Epstein’s 27 times,” said Sarnoff.

“It would not be surprising to find that some of these flight logs…were likely designed to hide evidence of criminal activity—or perhaps later cleansed of such evidence,” wrote the lawyers for some of Epstein’s accusers in a 2015 court filing.

Investigators may be interested in asking Mr. Epstein’s pilots whether they witnessed any efforts by Mr. Epstein to interfere with law enforcement, according to legal experts. In recent court filings, prosecutors have accused Mr. Epstein of tampering with witnesses, an allegation that Mr. Epstein’s lawyers denied in court.

Federal prosecutors in Miami and Mr. Epstein’s lawyers in 2007 negotiated over the possibility of Mr. Epstein pleading guilty to obstruction of justice, including for an incident involving one of his pilots, according to emails that became public in civil lawsuits. -Wall Street Journal

 

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Days after Jeffrey Epstein’s arrest on sex-trafficking charges in New York, Bill Clinton distanced himself from the high-flying financier and convicted sex offender. The former president owned up to just six encounters with Epstein, starting in 2002: Four flights on the billionaire’s private jet, a single trip to his Harlem office, and one “brief visit” to his New York apartment, all with staff and security detail in tow.

Now, a Daily Beast investigation has uncovered ties between Epstein and the Clinton administration that date back to the president’s earliest days in the White House, casting doubt on the oft-circulated narrative that the two only began associating after Clinton left office.

Jeffrey Epstein Willing To Post $100 Million Bail

​Epstein’s lawyer told a judge during a bail hearing that his client was “ready to sign” for bail no matter the cost. Last week, Epstein’s lawyers proposed a bail package that would let the multimillionaire await trial while under house arrest at his Manhattan home. The judge said he plans on deciding whether or not to let him go on Thursday. Epstein was arrested earlier this month and charged with sex trafficking of minors, as well as conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors. Federal prosecutors, as well as two of Epstein’s accusers, urged the judge to deny him bail.

As early as 1993, records show, Epstein donated $10,000 to the White House Historical Association and attended a donors’ reception hosted by Bill and Hillary Clinton. Around the same time, according to a source familiar with the connection, Epstein visited presidential aide Mark Middleton several times at The White House. Two years later, businesswoman Lynn Forester de Rothschild wrote a personal letter to Clinton thanking him for their talk about the financier.

“President Clinton knows nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has been recently charged in New York,” Clinton’s spokesperson, Angel Ureña, told The Daily Beast. “Any suggestion to the contrary, is both factually inaccurate and irresponsible.”

Jeffrey Epstein accuser urges more women to speak out

One of Jeffrey Epstein’s accusers urged other women Tuesday to come forward with allegations against the wealthy financier as federal authorities prosecute him on sex charges. Courtney Wild told reporters at a news conference in New York that Epstein “will never stop sexually abusing children until he is in jail.” “We will not get justice until you speak out,” Wild said, addressing anyone who believes they have been abused by Epstein. “You are not alone, and this was not your fault.” Wild’s remarks came a day after she appeared in Manhattan federal court and urged a judge to deny Epstein bail.

Representatives for Epstein, de Rothschild and Middleton did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Dinner At The White House

How Epstein entered Clinton’s orbit remains unclear. When the president released his initial statement on Epstein, he did not explain the multiple other trips he appears to have taken on the financier’s plane—including one flight to Westchester with Epstein, his alleged madam Ghislaine Maxwell, and an “unnamed female.”

Clinton also failed to mention the intimate 1995 fundraising dinner at the Palm Beach home of Revlon mogul Ron Perelman, where Clinton hobnobbed with the likes of Epstein, Don Johnson, and Jimmy Buffett. (Nearby, at Epstein’s own Palm Beach mansion, the money man allegedly abused hundreds of underage girls.)

The two were clearly chummy by the early Clinton Foundation years, as attested to by a 2002 photo of Epstein and Clinton in Brunei that appeared in Vicky Ward’s2003 profile of the financier. In a 2002 piece for New York magazine about the Africa trip, Clinton praised Epstein as a “highly successful financier and a committed philanthropist.”

Tape shows Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein discussing women at 1992 party

The November 1992 tape in the NBC archives shows Donald Trump with Jeffrey Epstein more than a decade before Epstein pleaded guilty to felony prostitution charges in Florida. The president says he hasn’t spoken to Epstein since, and that his relationship with him was no different than that of anyone else in their elite circle. “I knew him like everybody in Palm Beach knew him,” Trump said last week. “I was not a fan.” But on the tape, Trump gives Epstein plenty of personal attention. The 1992 footage was shot by NBC for Faith Daniels’ talk show, “A Closer Look,” in a profile of the newly divorced Trump’s lifestyle.

Politico recently claimed that Clinton and Epstein connected in the first few years after the president left office. Citing “people who know those involved,” the article pegged Maxwell as the glue connecting the two men, and Clinton’s daughter, Chelsea, as the tie between the president and the British socialite. Politico noted that Maxwell had vacationed with the Chelsea in 2009, attended her wedding in 2010, and participated in the Clinton Global Initiative as recently as 2013. (A Clinton spokesperson denied Chelsea and Ghislaine were close.)

Documents in the Clinton Library, however, attest to much earlier links between Maxwell, Epstein, and the Clinton White House.

In late September of 1993, Bill and Hillary Clinton hosted a reception for supporters who had contributed to recent White House renovations. The nearly $400,000 overhaul—which included new gold draperies and a 13-color woven rug for the Oval Office—was funded entirely by donations to the White House Historical Association, a private organization that helps preserve and promote the White House as a historical monument.

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An expired passport found in a locked safe in accused child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s Manhattan mansion — which contained Epstein’s photo but a different name — was used multiple times in 1980s, prosecutors said Wednesday. 

The reception took place at the White House residence from 7:30 to 9:30pm, according to a copy of the president’s daily schedule. White House Social Secretary Ann Stock—who appears in Epstein’s little black book of phone numbers—was listed as the point of contact. According to multiple attendees, the evening included an intimate tour of the newly refurbished residence, followed by a receiving line with the President and First Lady. Dessert was served in the East Room, where the couple thanked everyone for attending and announced the Committee for the Preservation of the White House.

Guests for the event, according to the invitation list, included the journalist and philanthropist Barbara Goldsmith, heiress Jane Engelhard, political consultant Cynthia Friedman, and “Mr Jeffrey Epstein and Ms. Ghislaine Maxwell.” Epstein and Maxwell do not appear on the ‘regret list,’ and there is a letter ‘A’ next to both of their names, indicating they planned to attend. A press release from the event, put out by Hillary Clinton’s office, lists Epstein as a White House Historical Association donor.

Attorneys for Epstein did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

A letter from the following month reveals the extent of the financier’s generosity. Bernard R. Meyer, the executive vice president of the White House Historical Association, sent a note to Epstein’s Madison Avenue offices on Oct. 4, thanking him for his $10,000 contribution. The donation, Meyer wrote, would “assist in funding the costs of refurbishing the Oval Office in the West Wing and certain areas of the Executive Residence.”

Financier Jeffrey Epstein to remain jailed until sex trafficking trial

American financier Jeffrey Epstein will remain behind bars while he awaits trial on charges of sex trafficking dozens of underage girls, a U.S. judge ruled on Thursday. U.S. District Judge Richard Berman announced his decision at a hearing in federal court in Manhattan, rejecting Epstein’s request to stay under house arrest in his New York mansion valued at $77 million. Epstein has pleaded not guilty. The money manager’s social circle over the years has included Donald Trump before he became U.S. president, former President Bill Clinton and Britain’s Prince Andrew.

A carbon copy of Meyer’s letter was also sent to A. Paul Prosperi—a college friend of Bill Clinton’s who visited Epstein frequently when the financier was jailed in 2008. Visitor logs show Prosperi, a Florida-based attorney, visited Epstein at least 20 times during the 13 months he spent in Palm Beach county jail for procuring an underage prostitute. Prosperi also attended the 1995 Perelman fundraiser where both Epstein and Clinton were present.

The White House refused to identify anyone associated with the Historical Association fundraising at the time, but records show Prosperi was intimately involved. The attorney is cc’d on letters to numerous donors, in which Meyer identifies him as the recipient of the contributions. Prosperi even wrote a $10,000 check to the association himself, according to a letter from Hillary Clinton’s personal counsel, Susan Thomases.

“I am forwarding the enclosed check in the amount of $10,000 to the White House Historical Association,” Thomases wrote to Meyer in 1993. “I expect to receive additional contributions and will forward them to you.”

Prosperi was convicted of fraud, filing false tax returns and forging securities to hide his multimillion-dollar swindle of a client in 1997. Clinton commuted his sentence in 2001, in one of his last acts as president. The attorney died in 2016.

White House Contacts

Epstein’s name also turns up in connection with another, shadowy figure in the Clinton administration: White House aide Mark E. Middleton. A friend of Clinton’s from Arkansas and an early addition to the president’s campaign, he joined the administration in 1993 as a special assistant to Chief of Staff Mack McClarty—another Arkansas insider—and added “Deputy to the Counselor” to his title in 1994.

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A sheriff in Florida ordered an internal investigation Friday into whether deputies violated any rules while monitoring Jeffrey Epstein, the wealthy New York financier, on a work-release program a decade ago. 

Over that same time period, a source with knowledge of the situation told The Daily Beast, Middleton met with Epstein in the White House at least three times. It is unclear what they discussed, or for how long. Middleton did not respond to repeated calls and emails for comment, or to a reporter who visited his home in Arkansas.

Middleton and Epstein also appear to have shared a famous friend in common. Donald Trump—who once called Epstein a “terrific guy”—sent Middleton a signed copy of his book, The Art of the Deal, while the lawyer was working in the White House. The inscription read, “To Mark — Best wishes. Your mom is the best.”

Hobnobbing with businessmen like Epstein and Trump was part and parcel of Middleton’s White House job, according to a 1999 report from the House Committee on Government Reform. (“In the course of his duties, Middleton was in contact with many prominent business people and contributors to the President,” the report states.) But it also got the lawyer in trouble with the administration once he left.

According to a 1996 Los Angeles Times article, Middleton maintained a telephone line at the White House for months after he departed, directing callers to the trade company where he started working afterward. (He also allegedly held on to his White House business cards.) That same year, the administration revoked Middleton’s access to the executive mansion without high-level approval, claiming he had abused his access to the White House to impress personal business clients.

Middleton eventually left the trade company to start his own international consulting business, but controversy followed him. In 1999, the House Committee on Government Reform subpoenaed him to testify in hearings about nearly half a million dollars in foreign donations to Clinton’s re-election campaign and the Democratic National Committee. The attorney refused to testify, invoking his right against self-incrimination. Several other figures in the scandal were later convicted of campaign finance violations.

Jeffrey Epstein appeals decision to deny bail in sex trafficking case

Financier Jeffrey Epstein has appealed a federal judge’s decision to keep him in jail while he awaits trial on sex trafficking charges. According to a court filing made public on Tuesday, Epstein will ask the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the judge’s July 18 rejection of his request to remain under house arrest in his mansion on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. In denying bail, U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan expressed concern that Epstein’s “past sexual conduct is not likely to have abated,” and that there might be “new victims” if Epstein were released. Epstein has pleaded not guilty.

‘My Fifteen Seconds of Access’

Jeffrey Epstein’s name shows up again in the Clinton Library archives in a letter dated April 27, 1995, from Lynn Forester to “President William T. Clinton.” Forester—known as Lynn Forester de Rothschild after her marriage to Sir Evelyn Robert de Rothschild—served on Clinton’s National Information Infrastructure Advisory Committee and on the president’s Secretary of Energy Advisory Board. She and her husband also spent the first night of their honeymoon in the Lincoln Bedroom by invitation of the Clintons.

In the 1995 letter, Forester de Rothschild writes, “Dear Mr. President: It was a pleasure to see you recently at Senator Kennedy’s house. There was too much to discuss and too little time. Using my fifteen seconds of access to discuss Jeffrey Epstein and currency stabilization, I neglected to talk to you about a topic near and dear to my heart. Namely, affirmative action and the future.” She then goes on to note that she’s sending him a memo on the latter subject, which George Stephanopoulos had asked her to write, and signs off, “Sincerely, Lynn Forester.”

The businesswoman did not respond to a request for comment left with her office.

What exactly Forester de Rothschild discussed with Clinton about Epstein and “currency stabilization” is unknown. In its 2002 profile of Epstein, New York noted that the mysterious money man liked to talk currency trading with his brainy pals—“the euro, the real, the yen.” And in 2003, Vicky Ward reported in Vanity Fair on his self-declared “skill at playing the currency markets ‘with very large sums of money’.” Epstein was also doing business and trading currencies with Deutsche Bank until a few months ago, when the bank ended the relationship.

Alan Dershowitz, Epstein’s onetime lawyer, previously claimed Forester de Rothschild was the first to introduce him to his future client. In a recent interview with New York magazine, Dershowitz recounted that in the summer of 1996, at a party on Martha’s Vineyard for Lord Rothschild, Forester de Rothschild told him, “I have this friend, he really would like to meet you.”

The friend turned out to be Epstein, another Brooklyn guy made big. “He was feisty, he was utterly politically incorrect,” Dershowitz recalled. “He was interesting to be with.”

Dershowitz has also been accused by an alleged victim of molesting her at Epstein’s Palm Beach house and on his private island. He vehemently denies the allegations.

—With additional reporting by Michael Daly