vault backup: 2026-09-25 22:09:08

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Alan Dershowitz.md

@@ -50,11 +50,11 @@ Dershowitz was among the lawyers Epstein assembled after the [[Palm Beach Police
 
 ### In the Prosecutors' Record
 
-The [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]]'s [[Office of Professional Responsibility]] described Dershowitz as "a self-described close friend of Epstein." Palm Beach State Attorney [[Barry Krischer]] told the office that Epstein's local counsel brought Dershowitz to see him and the assistant state attorney on the case, and that Dershowitz was "overly aggressive" and threatened, "We're going to destroy your witnesses; don't go to court because we're going to destroy those girls"; according to Krischer, Dershowitz so "tainted the waters" that Epstein also hired the local attorney [[Jack Goldberger]]. In the federal phase Dershowitz joined [[Gerald Lefcourt]] and Roy Black. He and Black met the line prosecutors on February 20, 2007 to present "witness issues," and on June 26, 2007 he led the defense presentation at a meeting at the Miami U.S. Attorney's Office with First Assistant [[Jeffrey Sloman]], Criminal Division chief [[Matthew Menchel]] and others, arguing that the state should handle the case because these were "traditionally state offenses."[^6]
+The [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]]'s [[Office of Professional Responsibility]] described Dershowitz as "a self-described close friend of Epstein." Palm Beach State Attorney [[Barry Krischer]] told the office that Epstein's local counsel brought Dershowitz to see him and the assistant state attorney on the case, and that Dershowitz was "overly aggressive" and threatened, "We're going to destroy your witnesses; don't go to court because we're going to destroy those girls"; according to Krischer, Dershowitz so "tainted the waters" that Epstein also hired the local attorney [[Jack Goldberger]]. In the federal phase Dershowitz joined [[Gerald Lefcourt]] and Roy Black. He and Black met the line prosecutors on February 20, 2007 to present "witness issues," and on June 26, 2007 he led the defense presentation at a meeting at the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida|Miami U.S. Attorney's Office]] with First Assistant [[Jeffrey Sloman]], Criminal Division chief [[Matthew Menchel]] and others, arguing that the state should handle the case because these were "traditionally state offenses."[^6]
 
 The federal prosecutors' 51-page chronology of the case lists a document from Lefcourt and Dershowitz to Menchel titled "Data that strongly supports the arguments made that no charge can or should be made under 18 U.S.C. § 2422(b)." In September 2007 the lawyer Nathan Z. Dershowitz represented Epstein's employee [[Harry Beller]] and a second Epstein employee when they were subpoenaed to the federal grand jury, and on September 12 he told the prosecutor that Epstein's assistant [[Lesley Groff]], also subpoenaed, would proceed by interview rather than testify. In late November 2007, after the agreement was signed, the chronology records an "Unscheduled meeting between Jay Lefkowitz, Alan Dershowitz and Jeff Sloman," a drop-in by Lefkowitz and Dershowitz. On December 7, 2007 the former federal judge [[Herbert J. Stern]] sent Dershowitz a 27-page letter, and the defense forwarded to the office the "independent ethics opinions" of Stern and the former Justice Department official [[Joe D. Whitley]] on the federal investigation.[^7]
 
-In May 2008 the U.S. Attorney's Office's Professional Responsibility Officer asked the Department whether Alexander Acosta should recuse himself from the case because he was considering a visiting professorship at [[Harvard Law School]] in 2009, while Dershowitz, a Harvard Law professor, was representing Epstein "as a private, paying client"; the Department found no basis for recusal. In March 2009, while Epstein was on work release, Sloman met Dershowitz in Miami for what Dershowitz called "a relaxed drink and conversation." Dershowitz then thanked him for his "assurance that the feds will not interfere with how the Palm Beach sheriff administers" Epstein's sentence "as long as he is treated like any similarly situated inmate"; Sloman replied that the office would not interfere but would object to alternative custody or home detention if asked. A week later Dershowitz thanked Sloman for his "willingness to call the sheriff and advise him that your office would take no position on how he handled Epstein's sentence," adding, "[L]et's put any call off for a while." In December 2009 Sloman told Dershowitz that the office opposed early termination of Epstein's community control and would object to transferring his supervision to the [[U.S. Virgin Islands]].[^8]
+In May 2008 the U.S. Attorney's Office's Professional Responsibility Officer asked the Department whether Alexander Acosta should recuse himself from the case because he was considering a visiting professorship at [[Harvard Law School]] in 2009, while Dershowitz, a Harvard Law professor, was representing Epstein "as a private, paying client"; the Department found no basis for recusal. In March 2009, while Epstein was on work release, Sloman met Dershowitz in Miami for what Dershowitz called "a relaxed drink and conversation." Dershowitz then thanked him for his "assurance that the feds will not interfere with how the [[Palm Beach, Florida|Palm Beach]] sheriff administers" Epstein's sentence "as long as he is treated like any similarly situated inmate"; Sloman replied that the office would not interfere but would object to alternative custody or home detention if asked. A week later Dershowitz thanked Sloman for his "willingness to call the sheriff and advise him that your office would take no position on how he handled Epstein's sentence," adding, "[L]et's put any call off for a while." In December 2009 Sloman told Dershowitz that the office opposed early termination of Epstein's community control and would object to transferring his supervision to the [[U.S. Virgin Islands]].[^8]
 
 ### The Giuffre Allegation and the Edwards-Cassell Suit
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Alan Greenberg.md

@@ -0,0 +1,67 @@
+---
+category: "Business & Finance"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - AlanGreenberg
+  - BearStearns
+  - JPMorganChase
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - WallStreet
+  - DonaldTrump
+alias:
+  - Alan "Ace" Greenberg
+  - Ace Greenberg
+  - Alan C. Greenberg
+  - Alan Courtney Greenberg
+summary: "Bear Stearns chief executive from 1978 to 1993 and chairman to 2001 who brought Jeffrey Epstein into the firm and in 2010, at JPMorgan, sought a felony-policy exception to keep doing business with him."
+born: 1927-09-03
+died: 2014-07-25
+location: "New York, New York"
+relations:
+  - type: head_of
+    with: "[[Bear Stearns]]"
+    role: "chairman of the board"
+    start: 1985
+    end: 2001
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[JPMorgan Chase]]"
+    role: "vice chairman emeritus"
+    start: 2008
+    end: 2014-07-25
+    fn: 1
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Alan Courtney "Ace" Greenberg (September 3, 1927 to July 25, 2014) was an American investment banker who ran [[Bear Stearns]] as chief executive from 1978 to 1993 and was its chairman from the firm's 1985 public offering until 2001. [[Jeffrey Epstein]] came to Bear Stearns in 1976 from the [[Dalton School]] through Greenberg, rose under him and [[James Cayne]] to limited partner, and kept his accounts at the firm until its 2008 collapse into [[JPMorgan Chase]]. After that sale Greenberg became vice chairman emeritus of JPMorgan, and in August 2010, according to the [[Government of the United States Virgin Islands|Virgin Islands]], he asked the bank's general counsel, [[Stephen Cutler]], for an exception to its policy on felon clients so that he could continue doing business with Epstein. Greenberg died five years before these communications became public.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### Career
+
+Greenberg was born in [[Wichita, Kansas]], the grandson of Russian Jewish immigrants, and grew up in [[Oklahoma City]]. He attended the [[University of Oklahoma]] on a football scholarship, transferred to the [[University of Missouri]], and joined Bear Stearns as a clerk in 1949 after it was the only firm of six to offer him a job. He took over the arbitrage desk, became a partner at 31, and succeeded Salim "Cy" Lewis as chief executive on Lewis's death in 1978, when the firm was a private partnership of about 1,000 employees and 46 million dollars in capital; by 1993, when he handed the post to Cayne, it had 6,300 employees and 1.8 billion dollars in shareholders' equity. He said he sought to hire people with "PSD" degrees, "poor, smart and a deep desire to become rich."[^1]
+
+His discretion made him valuable to corporate raiders. His clients included [[Donald Trump]] and [[Henry Kravis]]'s [[KKR]], and he helped Trump accumulate 9.6 percent of Bally Entertainment in Trump's unsuccessful 1986 takeover attempt. "I put my children's accounts with him," Trump said in 2006. "That should tell you how much I trust him." In 2004 Greenberg appeared on Trump's television program *[[The Apprentice]]*. He was a member of the Society of American Magicians and performed at fundraising dinners for the [[Jerusalem Foundation]], required Bear Stearns executives to give 4 percent of their salaries to charity, and in 1998 gave one million dollars to help poor elderly men buy Viagra.[^1]
+
+When JPMorgan agreed on March 16, 2008 to buy Bear Stearns for 2 dollars a share, later raised to 10, after a run on the firm, Greenberg stayed on as vice chairman emeritus of JPMorgan. In a 2010 book he blamed Cayne for the firm's collapse. He died of complications from cancer at [[Mount Sinai Hospital (Manhattan)|Mount Sinai Hospital]] in New York on July 25, 2014.[^1]
+
+### Epstein at Bear Stearns
+
+Epstein, then a teacher of physics and mathematics at Dalton, came to Bear Stearns after tutoring Greenberg's son there, and was friendly with a daughter of Greenberg's. Under Greenberg and Cayne he rose to limited partner, which *[[Fox Business]]*, citing former executives, reported he had reached by 1980.[^2][^4] He left in March 1981 after an internal inquiry that concerned a Regulation D violation. Cayne said, "Jeffrey Epstein left Bear Stearns of his own volition. It was never suggested that he leave by any member of management." Greenberg said he could not recall. Contemporaries told *[[Vanity Fair]]* of rumors that the executive committee asked for Epstein's resignation after his two supporters, Greenberg and Cayne, were outvoted, and a former executive told Fox Business in 2019 that Epstein "left at our invitation ... it was very serious stuff."[^2][^4]
+
+Epstein's company [[Financial Trust Company]] held a large block of Bear Stearns stock until the firm failed. In a verified complaint of August 5, 2009 against Bear Stearns, filed in the [[U.S. Virgin Islands]], Financial Trust named Cayne, Greenberg, [[Warren Spector]], [[Samuel Molinaro]] and [[Alan Schwartz]] as the officers whose statements Epstein had relied on in holding the shares, which it sold in March 2008 for 34.99 and 3.41 dollars a share.[^5]
+
+### The Felony Policy Exception
+
+After the 2008 sale, Epstein's brokerage accounts passed to JPMorgan, where retaining a client with a felony conviction required the general counsel's approval. In June 2023 the Virgin Islands, suing JPMorgan over its Epstein relationship, quoted a bank email stating that Greenberg had gone to Cutler "for an exception to the felony policy" for Epstein; its statement of material facts placed the request in August 2010.[^3][^6] On January 19, 2011, while the bank's anti-money-laundering staff were pressing to end the relationship, a JPMorgan Securities employee wrote to Epstein's office: "Ace would love to speak to Jeffrey. Can you please call Ace at [number], or e-mail him a phone number where Jeffrey can be reached?" JPMorgan had withheld the email as outside the "negotiated scope of search" until the territory asked for it by name.[^3]
+
+The bank's counsel at [[WilmerHale]] answered that "following Epstein's guilty plea in 2008, people from legacy Bear Stearns, including Mr. Greenberg, in connection with post-acquisition transition of accounts, may have attempted to speak with Stephen Cutler, then JPMC's General Counsel, about application of JPMC's corporate policy requiring approval of its General Counsel ... to retain a brokerage account for a client with a felony conviction," that the decision "was made by Mr. Cutler," and that there was "no evidence that Mr. Greenberg had anything to do with Epstein's accounts at the Private Bank." The territory asked the court to compel production of emails between Greenberg and Epstein and between Greenberg and [[Jamie Dimon]], [[Mary Erdoes]], [[Jes Staley]] or Cutler about Epstein. JPMorgan's internal 2019 review, Project Jeep, had opened with the note that "There is a highbridge angle and one dating back to Bear."[^3][^7] Greenberg had died in 2014 and made no statement on these matters.
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: "Alan 'Ace' Greenberg, who remade Bear Stearns, dies at 86." *Bloomberg News,* via *Portland Press Herald,* July 25, 2014. https://www.pressherald.com/2014/07/25/alan-ace-greenberg-who-remade-bear-stearns-dies-at-86/
+[^2]: Vicky Ward, "The Talented Mr. Epstein," *Vanity Fair,* March 2003, as republished by the author. https://vickyward.com/article/the-talented-mr-epstein/
+[^3]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02808715, Court Records (Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904), letter motion of Motley Rice to Judge Jed S. Rakoff seeking leave to reopen depositions, ECF No. 191, June 7, 2023 (filed June 20, 2023). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank%2C%20N.A.%2C%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/EFTA02808715.pdf
+[^4]: Charles Gasparino and Lydia Moynihan, "The woes of Jeffrey Epstein: How he maintained Wall Street connections while downplaying child sex accusations," *Fox Business,* August 10, 2019. https://www.foxbusiness.com/features/jeffrey-epstein-wall-street-connections-child-sex-trafficking
+[^5]: Financial Trust Company, Inc. v. The Bear Stearns Companies Inc., Civil No. 2009/106 (D.V.I.), Verified Complaint dated August 5, 2009; reproduced as Exhibit 253, ECF No. 244-8 (filed July 25, 2023), in Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.). https://web.archive.org/web/20260117011822/https://www.justice.gov/multimedia/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank,%20N.A.,%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/244-08.pdf
+[^6]: Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.), Plaintiff's Statement of Material Facts, ECF No. 221 (filed July 24, 2023), paras. 123-124, 149, 157-158. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.591653/gov.uscourts.nysd.591653.221.0.pdf
+[^7]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02808625, Court Records (Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904), letter of John J. Butts, WilmerHale, opposing the motion to reopen depositions, ECF No. 187, June 9, 2023 (filed June 15, 2023). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank%2C%20N.A.%2C%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/EFTA02808625.pdf

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Alexander Acosta.md

@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@ As U.S. Attorney he oversaw the 2006 prosecution of the [[Cali Drug Cartel]] lea
 
 ### The 2008 Non-Prosecution Agreement
 
-Federal investigators in the Southern District of Florida identified roughly 30, and ultimately more than 30, minors whom Epstein was alleged to have sexually abused, after the Palm Beach Police Department referred the case to the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation|FBI]] on concerns that the local prosecution would be too lenient. By May 2007 government lawyers had prepared an 82-page prosecution memorandum and a 53-page draft federal indictment charging Epstein with multiple federal sex offenses; the Justice Department later described the draft as a 60-count indictment. Acosta decided in 2007 to negotiate with Epstein's defense team rather than seek that indictment. At a July 31, 2007 meeting with Epstein's lawyers, his office offered to end the investigation if Epstein pleaded guilty to state charges, served at least two years, registered as a sex offender, and agreed to a damages mechanism for victims. Acosta did not sign the agreement but, according to the Justice Department's later review, "participated in its drafting and approved it, with knowledge of its terms."[^1][^6][^7]
+Federal investigators in the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida|Southern District of Florida]] identified roughly 30, and ultimately more than 30, minors whom Epstein was alleged to have sexually abused, after the [[Palm Beach Police Department]] referred the case to the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation|FBI]] on concerns that the local prosecution would be too lenient. By May 2007 government lawyers had prepared an 82-page prosecution memorandum and a 53-page draft federal indictment charging Epstein with multiple federal sex offenses; the Justice Department later described the draft as a 60-count indictment. Acosta decided in 2007 to negotiate with Epstein's defense team rather than seek that indictment. At a July 31, 2007 meeting with Epstein's lawyers, his office offered to end the investigation if Epstein pleaded guilty to state charges, served at least two years, registered as a sex offender, and agreed to a damages mechanism for victims. Acosta did not sign the agreement but, according to the Justice Department's later review, "participated in its drafting and approved it, with knowledge of its terms."[^1][^6][^7]
 
 The non-prosecution agreement, negotiated through 2007 and executed in stages, required Epstein to plead guilty in Palm Beach County court, which he did in June 2008, to state charges including soliciting prostitution and procuring a person under 18 for prostitution. He was sentenced to 18 months, of which he served roughly 13, under conditions that allowed extensive work release. The Justice Department's review recorded that from October 2008 he spent "12 hours a day purportedly working at the '[[Florida Science Foundation]],' an entity Epstein had recently incorporated that was co-located at the West Palm Beach office of one of Epstein's attorneys"; later reporting on sheriff's records described him leaving the jail for up to 16 hours a day, seven days a week. The foundation paid the [[Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office]] 128,136 dollars during his incarceration. Epstein's defense team included high-profile lawyers such as [[Alan Dershowitz|Alan Dershowitz]], [[Kenneth Starr|Kenneth Starr]], and [[Roy Black|Roy Black]], who pressed the office for concessions.[^1][^6][^7][^8][^9][^10]
 
@@ -90,7 +90,7 @@ The Office of Professional Responsibility recorded two recusal questions. In May
 
 ### Crime Victims' Rights Act Ruling
 
-In the case styled Doe v. United States, No. 08-80736, brought by victims including [[Courtney Wild|Courtney Wild]] and [[Jane Doe 2|Jane Doe 2]] to enforce their rights, United States District Judge [[Kenneth Marra|Kenneth Marra]] ruled on February 21, 2019, that the government had violated the Crime Victims' Rights Act by failing to confer with the victims before entering the non-prosecution agreement. The opinion recorded that "[w]hile the Government spent untold hours negotiating the terms and implications of the NPA with Epstein's attorneys, scant information was shared with victims," and that "[t]he Court is not ruling that the decision not to prosecute was improper." After the ruling the Justice Department recused Acosta's former office from the litigation and assigned the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Georgia to defend it. Marra wrote that "particularly problematic was the government's decision to conceal the existence of the" agreement and to "mislead the victims to believe that federal prosecution was still a possibility," finding that prosecutors had counseled the victims to have "patience" after the deal had been signed.[^7][^14]
+In the case styled [[Doe v. United States]], No. 08-80736, brought by victims including [[Courtney Wild|Courtney Wild]] and [[Jane Doe 2|Jane Doe 2]] to enforce their rights, United States District Judge [[Kenneth Marra|Kenneth Marra]] ruled on February 21, 2019, that the government had violated the Crime Victims' Rights Act by failing to confer with the victims before entering the non-prosecution agreement. The opinion recorded that "[w]hile the Government spent untold hours negotiating the terms and implications of the NPA with Epstein's attorneys, scant information was shared with victims," and that "[t]he Court is not ruling that the decision not to prosecute was improper." After the ruling the Justice Department recused Acosta's former office from the litigation and assigned the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Georgia to defend it. Marra wrote that "particularly problematic was the government's decision to conceal the existence of the" agreement and to "mislead the victims to believe that federal prosecution was still a possibility," finding that prosecutors had counseled the victims to have "patience" after the deal had been signed.[^7][^14]
 
 In a later ruling on September 16, 2019, Marra declined to invalidate the non-prosecution agreement itself, noting that Epstein had died and that rescission would not restore the victims' position, and he held that the victims were not entitled to monetary damages from the government under the statute. He refused the victims' request to order Acosta to meet with them, writing: "The Court has no jurisdiction over Alexander Acosta, the former U.S. Attorney, who is now a private citizen." The decisions established the CVRA violation as a finding of fact while leaving the underlying agreement in place.[^19][^20]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Ari Ben-Menashe.md

@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ Critics dispute the seniority he claims. Israel has generally characterized him
 
 ### Arms Case and Acquittal
 
-Ben-Menashe first drew wide public attention when he was arrested in the United States in November 1989 and charged under the Arms Export Control Act with attempting to broker the sale of three Israeli-owned Lockheed [[C-130 Hercules]] transport aircraft to Iran, a deal valued at about 36 million dollars, using false end-user certificates.[^4] The prosecution was brought in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, where the related rulings carried the caption United States v. Menashe.[^14] He spent nearly a year in custody before a jury acquitted him and a co-defendant on November 28, 1990, after his defense argued, and the jury accepted, that he had been acting under the authority of the Israeli government in a transaction tied to Israel's arms dealings with Iran.[^4]
+Ben-Menashe first drew wide public attention when he was arrested in the United States in November 1989 and charged under the Arms Export Control Act with attempting to broker the sale of three Israeli-owned Lockheed [[C-130 Hercules]] transport aircraft to Iran, a deal valued at about 36 million dollars, using false end-user certificates.[^4] The prosecution was brought in the United States District Court for the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]], where the related rulings carried the caption United States v. Menashe.[^14] He spent nearly a year in custody before a jury acquitted him and a co-defendant on November 28, 1990, after his defense argued, and the jury accepted, that he had been acting under the authority of the Israeli government in a transaction tied to Israel's arms dealings with Iran.[^4]
 
 Israel denied that he had been authorized to act for it in the transaction, repeating the position that he had been only a translator.[^4] The acquittal nonetheless rested on the jury's willingness to credit his Israeli-agent defense, and he afterward cited the verdict as vindication of his broader account, even though the bodies that later examined his substantive claims rejected them.[^2][^6] The acquittal gave him a platform from which he expanded a series of claims about secret United States and Israeli arms networks, set out in his 1992 book [[Profits of War]].[^5]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Bill Clinton.md

@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ Epstein donated 1,000 dollars to Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign and contri
 
 Flight logs released in civil litigation and later in document tranches list Clinton on flights aboard Epstein's Boeing 727, registration N908JE. Reporting on the logs in 2016 noted Clinton appearing on at least 26 flight "legs," a figure that counts individual segments of multi-stop trips rather than distinct journeys, and noted that he traveled on at least some legs without his [[United States Secret Service|Secret Service]] detail. Maxwell, recorded in the logs by the initials "GM," appears on the trips, as do entries read as the initials of Epstein assistant [[Sarah Kellen]]. The logs record who boarded which aircraft and when; they do not, on their face, establish what occurred at any destination.[^2][^3]
 
-[[FactCheck.org]], reviewing the manifests, counted six trips comprising the 26 flights between February 2002 and November 2003, the discrepancy between trip and leg counts arising from whether each take-off and landing is tallied separately. The documented segments included a February 2002 Miami-to-Westchester hop, a round trip from New York to London in March 2002, a May 2002 sequence through Japan, [[Hong Kong]], Singapore, and Brunei, a July 2002 stop tied to a wedding in Morocco, the September 2002 Africa tour, and a November 2003 routing through Brussels, Oslo, Hong Kong, and Beijing. President [[Donald Trump]] in 2025 claimed Clinton flew on the plane "27 or 28 times," a characterization FactCheck.org described as conflating the leg total with the number of trips; the same review found no flight log placing Clinton on an aircraft bound for the U.S. Virgin Islands.[^11]
+[[FactCheck.org]], reviewing the manifests, counted six trips comprising the 26 flights between February 2002 and November 2003, the discrepancy between trip and leg counts arising from whether each take-off and landing is tallied separately. The documented segments included a February 2002 Miami-to-Westchester hop, a round trip from New York to London in March 2002, a May 2002 sequence through Japan, [[Hong Kong]], Singapore, and Brunei, a July 2002 stop tied to a wedding in Morocco, the September 2002 Africa tour, and a November 2003 routing through Brussels, Oslo, Hong Kong, and Beijing. President [[Donald Trump]] in 2025 claimed Clinton flew on the plane "27 or 28 times," a characterization FactCheck.org described as conflating the leg total with the number of trips; the same review found no flight log placing Clinton on an aircraft bound for the [[U.S. Virgin Islands]].[^11]
 
 Maxwell, deposed in the Giuffre litigation, stated of the island that "just so we are clear, the allegations that Clinton had a meal on Jeffrey's island is 100 percent false." On one of the 2003 legs, from Oslo to the Russian city of Novosibirsk, the manifest listed Clinton, Epstein, the aide [[Doug Band]], and individuals identified by the initials "GM" and "SK." No court, prosecutor, or official investigation has produced a finding that Clinton witnessed or participated in any crime aboard the aircraft.[^12][^2]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Cornelius Blackshear.md

@@ -7,9 +7,9 @@ tags:
 summary: "Cornelius Blackshear was a U.S."
 ---
 
-Cornelius Blackshear was a U.S. Trustee in the Southern District of New York who later became a U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge for the Southern District of New York. He became a key figure in the allegations surrounding the attempted conversion of [[INSLAW|Inslaw]]'s bankruptcy case and a subsequent alleged cover-up.
+Cornelius Blackshear was a U.S. Trustee in the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]] who later became a U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge for the Southern District of New York. He became a key figure in the allegations surrounding the attempted conversion of [[INSLAW|Inslaw]]'s bankruptcy case and a subsequent alleged cover-up.
 
-Blackshear initially testified in a deposition on March 25, 1987, that [[William White]], the U.S. Trustee for the District of Columbia, had told him that [[Thomas Stanton]], Director of the Executive Office of U.S. Trustees (EOUST), had tried to pressure White to convert [[INSLAW]]'s Chapter 11 reorganization to a Chapter 7 liquidation and to have [[Harry Jones]] assigned to White to effect the conversion. Blackshear also stated that Stanton had never contacted him about detailing Jones, but he thought Stanton might have approached Jones directly. This testimony supported Inslaw's primary allegation of a plot to liquidate the company. However, after speaking with White, Blackshear realized he was mistaken and had confused Inslaw with the UPI case, about which White had told him the IRS had pressured him to join a motion to convert. Blackshear then prepared and signed an affidavit recanting his deposition testimony, stating that he had confused the cases. He also gave a second deposition repeating his new recollections. During the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) investigation, Blackshear essentially repeated his recanting statements, maintaining that White had not told him Stanton pressured him to convert Inslaw, and that he had confused Inslaw with UPI. He did, however, disagree with White regarding a conversation about the possible assignment of Harry Jones to Washington, believing White had told him Stanton planned to bring Jones to Washington, while White maintained Blackshear told this to White. Blackshear also denied discussing with [[Anthony Pasciuto]] at a social gathering that he was sorry for his conduct or had given false testimony in his recantation to avoid hurting people.[^1]
+Blackshear initially testified in a deposition on March 25, 1987, that [[William White]], the U.S. Trustee for the District of Columbia, had told him that [[Thomas Stanton]], Director of the Executive Office of U.S. Trustees (EOUST), had tried to pressure White to convert [[INSLAW]]'s Chapter 11 reorganization to a Chapter 7 liquidation and to have [[Harry Jones]] assigned to White to effect the conversion. Blackshear also stated that Stanton had never contacted him about detailing Jones, but he thought Stanton might have approached Jones directly. This testimony supported Inslaw's primary allegation of a plot to liquidate the company. However, after speaking with White, Blackshear realized he was mistaken and had confused Inslaw with the UPI case, about which White had told him the IRS had pressured him to join a motion to convert. Blackshear then prepared and signed an affidavit recanting his deposition testimony, stating that he had confused the cases. He also gave a second deposition repeating his new recollections. During the [[Office of Professional Responsibility]] (OPR) investigation, Blackshear essentially repeated his recanting statements, maintaining that White had not told him Stanton pressured him to convert Inslaw, and that he had confused Inslaw with UPI. He did, however, disagree with White regarding a conversation about the possible assignment of Harry Jones to Washington, believing White had told him Stanton planned to bring Jones to Washington, while White maintained Blackshear told this to White. Blackshear also denied discussing with [[Anthony Pasciuto]] at a social gathering that he was sorry for his conduct or had given false testimony in his recantation to avoid hurting people.[^1]
 
 Bankruptcy Judge Bason, in his findings, chose to believe Blackshear's original testimony and found his recantation to be the result of an "honest mistake." However, several years later, in January 1991, Bason filed a complaint against Blackshear with the Judicial Council of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, stating that he now believed Blackshear recanted not due to an honest mistake but because he made a conscious choice to testify falsely. The OPR, however, credited Blackshear's recantation, noting that he had no apparent motive to lie about the matter. The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI) found Blackshear's recantation implausible, noting that he had stated on four occasions prior to his recantation that White told him about pressure from Stanton to convert the Inslaw case. The PSI also found no evidence to support Blackshear's explanation that he had confused Inslaw with the UPI case. The Special Counsel's investigation concluded that there was insufficient evidence to prove that Blackshear lied when he recanted his deposition testimony. The report acknowledged the confusion arising from Blackshear's various statements but attributed it to poor memory rather than intentional misstatements. The Special Counsel found no reason why Blackshear, a sitting bankruptcy judge, would commit perjury and jeopardize his career.[^1]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Geoffrey Berman.md

@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ Epstein died in the [[Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York]] on August 10,
 
 ### Removal
 
-On the night of Friday, June 19, 2020, Barr issued a statement that Berman was "stepping down" and that Trump would nominate [[Jay Clayton]], chairman of the [[Securities and Exchange Commission]], to replace him, with [[Craig Carpenito]], the U.S. Attorney for [[New Jersey]], to serve in the interim. Berman answered that he had learned of his departure from a press release: "I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position, to which I was appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York." On June 20 Barr wrote to him: "Unfortunately, with your statement of last night, you have chosen public spectacle over public service... Because you have declared that you have no intention of resigning, I have asked the President to remove you as of today, and he has done so." Trump told reporters, "That's his department, not my department... I'm not involved"; a senior administration official told NBC News that Barr had asked Trump for permission to fire Berman and Trump had agreed.[^4][^5]
+On the night of Friday, June 19, 2020, Barr issued a statement that Berman was "stepping down" and that Trump would nominate [[Jay Clayton]], chairman of the [[Securities and Exchange Commission]], to replace him, with [[Craig Carpenito]], the U.S. Attorney for [[New Jersey]], to serve in the interim. Berman answered that he had learned of his departure from a press release: "I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position, to which I was appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]]." On June 20 Barr wrote to him: "Unfortunately, with your statement of last night, you have chosen public spectacle over public service... Because you have declared that you have no intention of resigning, I have asked the President to remove you as of today, and he has done so." Trump told reporters, "That's his department, not my department... I'm not involved"; a senior administration official told NBC News that Barr had asked Trump for permission to fire Berman and Trump had agreed.[^4][^5]
 
 Berman left that evening after Barr agreed that his deputy, [[Audrey Strauss]], would lead the office as acting U.S. Attorney, a condition Berman said safeguarded the district's "tradition of integrity and independence." On July 2, 2020, twelve days later, the office under Strauss announced the arrest of [[Ghislaine Maxwell]] on charges of conspiring with Epstein.[^4][^5][^8]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Harry Beller.md

@@ -0,0 +1,62 @@
+---
+category: "Crime & Abuse Networks"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - HarryBeller
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - Accountant
+  - JPMorganChase
+  - SuspiciousActivityReports
+  - SouthernTrust
+  - RonWyden
+alias:
+  - Harry Beller
+summary: "Jeffrey Epstein's in-house accountant, who held power of attorney over his JPMorgan accounts, made the cash withdrawals flagged in the bank's suspicious activity reports, and was never questioned by federal prosecutors."
+location: "New York, New York"
+relations:
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Jeffrey Epstein]]"
+    role: "in-house accountant with power of attorney over his JPMorgan accounts"
+    fn: 1
+  - type: represented
+    with: "[[Nathan Z. Dershowitz]]"
+    reverse: true
+    start: 2007-09
+    role: "counsel on a federal grand jury subpoena"
+    fn: 4
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Harry Beller is a New York accountant who worked for [[Jeffrey Epstein]] as his in-house accountant. He held power of attorney and signatory authority over Epstein's accounts at [[JPMorgan Chase]], executed wires for him, and made cash withdrawals that the bank flagged to the [[U.S. Department of the Treasury|Treasury]] in suspicious activity reports. He was subpoenaed to the federal grand jury in [[Florida]] in 2007, directed the 2012 wire that paid the application fee for Epstein's Virgin Islands tax-incentive company, and in 2025 and 2026 was named by the minority staff of the [[Senate Finance Committee]] under Senator [[Ron Wyden]] as a person whose role merited criminal investigation. Wyden's August 2026 report stated that federal prosecutors had never questioned him. He has not been charged with any crime.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### The Grand Jury Subpoena
+
+In the federal investigation that ended with Epstein's [[Epstein non-prosecution agreement|non-prosecution agreement]], the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida]] subpoenaed Beller to the grand jury in September 2007, in the same weeks as subpoenas to Epstein's assistant [[Lesley Groff]], the model agent [[Jean-Luc Brunel]] and [[Bear Stearns]]. The lawyer [[Nathan Z. Dershowitz]] represented Beller and a second Epstein employee on their subpoenas, and on September 12, 2007 told the prosecutor that Groff would "proceed by interview." The agreement was signed on September 24, 2007.[^4]
+
+### JPMorgan Accounts and Cash
+
+A forensic accountant retained by the Virgin Islands identified 134 JPMorgan accounts owned by Epstein or related people and entities, including accounts for Beller, [[Richard Kahn]], [[Darren Indyke]] and [[Ghislaine Maxwell]].[^2][^5] According to a November 19, 2025 memorandum by a Senate Finance Committee investigator to Wyden, based on JPMorgan records unsealed in the territory's suit against the bank, Beller "had power of attorney over Epstein's bank accounts at JPMC and withdrew massive amounts of cash at Epstein's direction," and suspicious activity reports filed by the bank "documented how Beller had signatory authority over Epstein's accounts and withdrew millions of dollars in cash on Epstein's behalf." A report JPMorgan filed with the Treasury on August 13, 2019, after Epstein's arrest, stated the bank's belief that "both Indyke and Beller controlled movement of Epstein's funds as signers of several Epstein accounts."[^1]
+
+Internal bank correspondence recorded that Beller cashed 20 checks totaling about 800,000 dollars from January 2007 through 2008. In March 2012, when a risk executive raised 160,000 dollars in cash withdrawals that Epstein said paid for jet fuel, [[John Duffy]], chief executive of JPMorgan's U.S. private bank, answered that "this is a better pattern than I thought...I did ask him to withdraw this cash from his aviation account for these payments," and, according to the memorandum, suggested following up about the withdrawals with Beller, "who we know." In 2013 compliance executives found more than 920,000 dollars in cash withdrawals from his accounts between 2009 and 2013, "all conducted in NY by POA Harry Beller."[^1]
+
+### The Southern Trust Application Fee
+
+On September 21, 2012 Beller faxed JPMorgan a memorandum directing it to wire 5,000 dollars from Epstein's account through Pacific Coast Banker's Bank to Merchants Commercial Bank in [[St. Thomas]], "for further credit to Kellerhals Ferguson LLP," the firm of Epstein's territorial lawyer [[Erika Kellerhals]]; Epstein's statement for the month records the debit with the reference "Southern Trust Company Application Fee." Two months later Epstein and Kellerhals presented [[Southern Trust Company]] to the Virgin Islands [[Economic Development Commission]], which granted it a ten-year tax-incentive certificate from February 1, 2013. The territory later estimated that the certificate let Epstein avoid 80,576,236 dollars in taxes.[^6][^7]
+
+### Congressional Inquiries
+
+The memorandum recalled that in September 2025 Wyden had pointed out to Treasury Secretary [[Scott Bessent]] that Treasury records documented that Indyke and Beller "had signatory authority over Epstein's bank accounts and were responsible for executing hundreds of millions of dollars in suspicious transactions on Epstein's behalf." Wyden's Produce Epstein Treasury Records Act, S. 2746, introduced on September 9, 2025, would require the Treasury to produce suspicious activity reports relating to a list of people and entities that includes Beller, Kellerhals, Indyke, Kahn and Maxwell. The November 2025 staff memorandum concluded that "Epstein's accountant Harry Beller was an integral part of Epstein's financial operation and his potential links to sex trafficking crimes merits further investigation," and that "Beller and Darren Indyke's roles as financial intermediaries for Epstein, merit further investigation."[^1][^8]
+
+Wyden's August 4, 2026 report, "Looking the Other Way," called for criminal investigations of Indyke, Kahn and Beller, stating that federal prosecutors had never questioned them. None of the three has been charged with a crime.[^3]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: U.S. Senate Committee on Finance, Memorandum to Senator Ron Wyden, Ranking Member, "JPMorgan Chase & Co. underreported Epstein's suspicious transactions to the U.S. government and should be the subject of further investigation," November 19, 2025 (redacted), sections V and VII, pp. 12 to 17, citing JPM-SDNYLIT-W-00017206-207 (SAR number 127304700, filed August 13, 2019) and JPM-SDNY-LIT-00269719. https://www.finance.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/memorandum_to_senator_wyden_on_jpmc-epstein_redactedpdf.pdf
+[^2]: Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.), Expert Report of Jorge Amador, ECF No. 238-31 (filed July 25, 2023), report pp. 6, 16-17, 24, 46. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.591653/gov.uscourts.nysd.591653.238.31.pdf
+[^3]: U.S. Senate Committee on Finance, Ranking Member Ron Wyden, "Looking the Other Way: How Wall Street Banks Enabled Jeffrey Epstein's Sex Trafficking," August 4, 2026, pp. 3-6, 50-61. https://www.finance.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/wyden_wall_street_epstein_report.pdf
+[^4]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00224943, DataSet 9, "Epstein Investigation Timeline," Exhibit A-1 (U.S. Attorney's Office, Southern District of Florida), pp. 11, 21. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00224943.pdf
+[^5]: U.S. Senate Committee on Finance, Ranking Member Ron Wyden, "Looking the Other Way: How Wall Street Banks Enabled Jeffrey Epstein's Sex Trafficking," August 4, 2026, pp. 5-7, 15-43 (forensic accounting of 134 JPMorgan accounts). https://www.finance.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/wyden_wall_street_epstein_report.pdf
+[^6]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA01580553, DataSet 10, memorandum from Harry Beller to JPMorgan wire desk, September 21, 2012 (JPM-SDNY-00059908); EFTA01483636, DataSet 10, JPMorgan statement for Jeffrey E. Epstein, September 1-28, 2012 (JPM-SDNY-00004812). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%2010/EFTA01580553.pdf ; https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%2010/EFTA01483636.pdf
+[^7]: Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. Estate of Jeffrey E. Epstein, No. ST-20-CV-14 (V.I. Super. Ct.), Second Amended Complaint, paragraphs 157 to 159 and 175, filed as Exhibit 1 to Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.), ECF No. 1-1 (December 27, 2022). https://web.archive.org/web/20260117011558/https://www.justice.gov/multimedia/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank,%20N.A.,%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/001-01.pdf
+[^8]: S. 2746, 119th Congress, "Produce Epstein Treasury Records Act," introduced September 9, 2025, section 2(b)(2). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/BILLS-119s2746is/html/BILLS-119s2746is.htm

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Jack Goldberger.md

@@ -0,0 +1,68 @@
+---
+category: "Law Enforcement & Legal"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - JackGoldberger
+  - Lawyer
+  - CriminalDefense
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - PalmBeach
+  - WorkRelease
+  - FloridaScienceFoundation
+alias:
+  - Jack Alan Goldberger
+  - Jack A. Goldberger
+  - Jack Goldberger
+summary: "West Palm Beach criminal defense lawyer who handled Jeffrey Epstein's 2008 state plea, whose law office housed the Florida Science Foundation of Epstein's work release, and who defended Epstein in 2009 civil suits."
+location: "West Palm Beach, Florida"
+relations:
+  - type: founded
+    with: "[[Goldberger Weiss]]"
+    role: "founding partner"
+    fn: 1
+  - type: participant_in
+    with: "[[Epstein non-prosecution agreement]]"
+    role: "defense counsel for the state plea"
+    start: 2007-09-12
+    end: 2009-06
+    fn: 2
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Jack Alan Goldberger is a criminal defense lawyer in [[West Palm Beach, Florida|West Palm Beach]], founding partner of the firm now called [[Goldberger Weiss]], who represented [[Jeffrey Epstein]] before the Palm Beach State Attorney's Office from 2006 and at his June 30, 2008 guilty plea in state court under the [[Epstein non-prosecution agreement]]. The application that won Epstein daytime release from the Palm Beach County Stockade listed his employer, the [[Florida Science Foundation]], at Goldberger's office address and with his firm's telephone number. The line federal prosecutor wrote in December 2008 that "since Day 1, Goldberger and [Krischer] . . . have been scheming to get Epstein out on work release."[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### Practice
+
+Goldberger received a B.A. from [[Syracuse University]] in 1974 and a J.D. from the [[University of Miami School of Law]] in 1978, and was admitted to the Florida Bar in 1978. He has been board-certified in criminal law by the Florida Bar since 1996. His firm's biography lists him as a past member of the board of the Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, past president of the Palm Beach County Criminal Defense Association, a past member of the Palm Beach County Criminal Justice Commission and past chairman of its Courts Task Force, and past chairman of the Palm Beach County Bar Association's Criminal Court Advisory Committee, and states that his clients include "corporate executives in both the public and private sector, wall street executives, entertainment figures, and professional sports athletes and executives." The firm was earlier styled Atterbury, Goldberger & Weiss.[^1][^4]
+
+### The State Case
+
+Epstein's first local lawyer was a former Palm Beach County assistant state attorney. According to State Attorney [[Barry Krischer]]'s account to the [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]]'s [[Office of Professional Responsibility]], that lawyer brought [[Alan Dershowitz]] to see Krischer, and Dershowitz so "tainted the waters" that Epstein also hired Goldberger, with whom Krischer had "a working relationship." The assistant state attorney handling the case was married to Goldberger's law partner; once Goldberger was retained she was removed and [[Lanna Belohlavek]] took over. "Goldberger, together with Gerald Lefcourt, a nationally known New York criminal defense attorney also representing Epstein, then directed their efforts at Belohlavek and Krischer to dissuade the office from prosecuting Epstein, largely by attacking the credibility of the victim witnesses."[^2]
+
+On September 12, 2007 Goldberger, [[Jay Lefkowitz]] and [[Gerald Lefcourt]] met the federal prosecutors together with Krischer and Belohlavek, a meeting at which, the Office of Professional Responsibility found, "the USAO made additional concessions." On September 21 the line prosecutor, [[Ann Marie Villafana|A. Marie Villafaña]], summarized the State Attorney's negotiations with Goldberger, including his request that Epstein not have to register as a sex offender. On December 7, 2007 Goldberger filed a notice of hearing setting the plea for January 4, 2008; on January 2 he told Belohlavek that the hearing was postponed because the facts "did not fit the proposed state charge." In the spring of 2008, while Epstein's appeal was pending before the Deputy Attorney General, Krischer told the federal office that he and Goldberger had arrived at a resolution involving a 90-day jail term. Villafaña wrote to her supervisor: "Please tell me that you are joking. Maybe we should throw him [Epstein] a party and tell him we are sorry to have bothered him."[^2][^5]
+
+### The Plea and the Stockade
+
+In late June 2008 Villafaña objected that the draft state plea form provided for community control, and reported that Goldberger "'swore' that Epstein would be in custody 24-hours-a-day" but "let it slip that Epstein would not be at the jail, he would be at the stockade." Goldberger agreed to insert the word "imprisoned" after "6 months"; the signed form instead carried "jail sentence." Epstein appeared with Goldberger on June 30, 2008 and pleaded guilty to felony solicitation of prostitution and to procuring a person under 18 for prostitution. When the judge asked whether the plea was tied to promises by other jurisdictions, Goldberger and Belohlavek disclosed the non-prosecution agreement at sidebar, and the court ordered it filed under seal. That afternoon Villafaña gave Goldberger the list of 31 victims to whom the agreement's civil-damages provision applied, and on July 10 she sent him a "Final Notification of Identified Victims" listing 32.[^2]
+
+The day after the plea a sheriff's official told Villafaña that Epstein "would be eligible for work release and will be placed on work release," contrary to what Goldberger had "specifically told" her days earlier. She noted that the "Florida Science Foundation," where Epstein told the court he had worked "every day" for "a couple of years," did not exist until November 2007, and that the address he gave the court for it "was the office of Epstein's attorney Jack Goldberger." On December 3, 2008 she wrote to her supervisors: "It appears that, since Day 1, Goldberger and [Krischer] . . . have been scheming to get Epstein out on work release. For example, the indictment incorrectly charges Epstein for an offense that would have made him ineligible for work release if it had been charged correctly." On December 11 she wrote to the sheriff's Corrections Division that the telephone number on Epstein's work release application for the foundation was that of Goldberger's law firm. "The Sheriff's Office neither acknowledged nor responded." The foundation paid the [[Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office]] 128,136 dollars during Epstein's incarceration, and deputies' July 2009 overtime reports on the detail read "Provide security for Jeffrey Epstein."[^2][^3][^6]
+
+On June 12, 2009 Villafaña wrote to Goldberger about a violation of the agreement, and on June 15 to Lefkowitz, [[Roy Black]] and Goldberger on the history of Epstein's performance; no indictment followed.[^5]
+
+### Civil Suits
+
+In the 2009 federal suit Jane Doe No. 102 v. Jeffrey Epstein, brought by [[Virginia Giuffre]] before Judge [[Kenneth Marra]] in the [[United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida|Southern District of Florida]], Epstein was represented by Robert D. Critton Jr. of Burman, Critton, Luttier & Coleman and by Goldberger of Atterbury, Goldberger & Weiss. The case ended in a settlement whose agreement and release was filed in 2021 in [[Giuffre v. Prince Andrew]].[^4]
+
+Goldberger remained Epstein's co-counsel in Epstein v. Rothstein, the Palm Beach County suit Epstein filed in 2009 against [[Scott Rothstein]] and [[Bradley Edwards]], which became Edwards's counterclaim for malicious prosecution. On November 9, 2018 Epstein's counsel, Goldberger among them, moved for in camera inspection of 302 emails withheld on a 1,607-entry privilege log by Edwards and by [[Paul Cassell]], who with [[Jay Howell]] represented three victims as limited intervenors, arguing that most were "e-mails among attorneys and staff" and "with media sources." Epstein settled the counterclaim the next month with a written apology to Edwards.[^7][^8]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: Goldberger Weiss, P.A., "Attorneys: Jack Goldberger." https://www.goldbergerweiss.com/attorneys/
+[^2]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02847284, Prior DOJ Disclosures, Office of Professional Responsibility, report, "Investigation into the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida's Resolution of Its 2006-2008 Federal Criminal Investigation of Jeffrey Epstein and Its Interactions with Victims during the Investigation," November 2020, pp. 8, 14-16, 64, 94, 101, 109-112, 114-116, 234-238. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Prior%20DOJ%20Disclosures/Memos.%20&%20Correspondence/EFTA02847284.pdf
+[^3]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00224943, DataSet 9, "Epstein Investigation Timeline," Exhibit A-1, privileged chronology of the federal investigation, pp. 23, 37 to 39. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00224943.pdf
+[^4]: Settlement Agreement and General Release, Jane Doe No. 102 v. Jeffrey Epstein, No. 09-80656-CIV-Marra/Johnson (S.D. Fla.), filed as Exhibit A, ECF No. 32-1, in Giuffre v. Prince Andrew, No. 1:21-cv-06702 (S.D.N.Y.); complaint at ECF No. 35-2. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.564713/gov.uscourts.nysd.564713.32.1.pdf
+[^5]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00224943, DataSet 9, "Epstein Investigation Timeline," Exhibit A-1, pp. 14, 19 to 20, 45 to 51. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00224943.pdf
+[^6]: "Jeffrey Epstein paid Palm Beach Sheriff's Office $128,000 during incarceration for prostitution charges," *WPTV,* 2019. https://www.wptv.com/news/region-c-palm-beach-county/new-jeffrey-epstein-paid-palm-beach-sheriffs-office-128-000-during-incarceration-for-prostitution ; U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA01308629, DataSet 10, Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office Extra Duty Permits System overtime report forms, Permit No. 7804, "Florida Science Foundation," July 1 to 14, 2009. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%2010/EFTA01308629.pdf
+[^7]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02768436, Court Records (Epstein v. Rothstein, No. 50-2009-CA-040800-XXXX-MB (Fla. 15th Cir. Ct. 2009)), Counter-Defendant Jeffrey Epstein's Motion for an In Camera Inspection of E-mails, e-filed November 9, 2018, pp. 1, 3, 17, 21. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Court%20Records/Epstein%20v.%20Rothstein%2C%20No.%2050-2009-CA-040800-XXXX-MB%20(Fla.%2015th%20Cir.%20Ct.%202009)/EFTA02768436.pdf
+[^8]: "Millionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein apologizes in settling malicious prosecution suit," *CNN,* December 4, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/04/politics/jeffrey-epstein-lawsuit-settled

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Jay Clayton.md

@@ -0,0 +1,95 @@
+---
+category: "Intelligence & Government"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - JayClayton
+  - SEC
+  - SullivanAndCromwell
+  - ApolloGlobalManagement
+  - SDNY
+  - DirectorOfNationalIntelligence
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - EpsteinFiles
+alias:
+  - Walter J. Clayton III
+summary: "Sullivan & Cromwell partner whose clients included Deutsche Bank and Reid Hoffman, SEC chairman, Apollo chairman after Leon Black, SDNY U.S. Attorney assigned Epstein matters in 2025, then Director of National Intelligence."
+location: "New York, New York"
+relations:
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Sullivan & Cromwell]]"
+    role: "partner"
+    end: 2017
+    fn: 1
+  - type: represented
+    with: "[[Deutsche Bank]]"
+    role: "client of Clayton at Sullivan & Cromwell, disclosed to the Office of Government Ethics"
+    end: 2017
+    fn: 2
+  - type: represented
+    with: "[[Reid Hoffman]]"
+    role: "client of Clayton at Sullivan & Cromwell, disclosed to the Office of Government Ethics"
+    end: 2017
+    fn: 2
+  - type: head_of
+    with: "[[Securities and Exchange Commission]]"
+    role: "chairman"
+    start: 2017-05-04
+    end: 2020-12
+    fn: 1
+  - type: head_of
+    with: "[[Apollo Global Management]]"
+    role: "non-executive chairman of the board, succeeding Leon Black"
+    start: 2021-03-22
+    fn: 7
+  - type: investigated
+    with: "[[Jeffrey Epstein]]"
+    role: "assigned by the Attorney General to investigate Epstein's dealings with Clinton, Summers, Hoffman and JPMorgan Chase"
+    start: 2025-11-14
+    fn: 3
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Walter J. "Jay" Clayton III is an American lawyer who was a partner of [[Sullivan & Cromwell]], chairman of the [[Securities and Exchange Commission]] from 2017 to 2020, non-executive chairman of [[Apollo Global Management]] in succession to its founder [[Leon Black]], and from 2025 [[United States]] Attorney for the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]]. In November 2025 Attorney General [[Pam Bondi]] assigned him to investigate [[Jeffrey Epstein]]'s dealings with [[Bill Clinton]], [[Larry Summers]], [[Reid Hoffman]] and [[JPMorgan Chase]]; Hoffman and [[Deutsche Bank]] had been among the clients Clayton disclosed on his 2017 government ethics filing. He was sworn in as the ninth [[Director of National Intelligence]] on August 3, 2026.[^1][^2][^3][^4]
+
+### Sullivan & Cromwell
+
+Clayton was born at Fort Eustis in [[Newport News, Virginia|Newport News]], [[Virginia]], and grew up mostly in central and southeastern [[Pennsylvania]]. He holds an engineering degree from the [[University of Pennsylvania]], degrees in economics from the [[University of Cambridge]], where he was a Thouron Scholar, and a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School. After clerking for Judge Marvin Katz of the [[U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania]], he joined Sullivan & Cromwell, became a partner, sat on its management committee and co-headed its corporate practice; from 2009 to 2017 he also taught at Penn Law.[^1]
+
+On his nomination to the SEC, Clayton filed a financial disclosure with the [[Office of Government Ethics]] listing clients from which he had earned more than 5,000 dollars in a year. They included Deutsche Bank AG, [[Goldman Sachs|The Goldman Sachs Group]] and the Goldman Sachs Philanthropy Fund, [[Barclays]], UBS Securities, [[Brown Brothers Harriman]], [[Bessemer Trust]], [[SoftBank]], the [[Royal Bank of Canada]], [[Pershing Square Capital Management|Pershing Square]], [[Paul Tudor Jones]], [[Valeant Pharmaceuticals]], [[Volkswagen]], [[TeliaSonera]], Suning Commerce Group, [[The Weinstein Company]] and Reid Hoffman. Four individual and five corporate clients were withheld "because the disclosure of the representations are the subject of attorney-client privilege and other confidentiality obligations," two of them because they were "the subject of a pending non-public investigation." He reported 7.6 million dollars in income from the firm in the preceding year.[^2][^5]
+
+### SEC and Apollo
+
+Nominated by President [[Donald Trump]] on January 20, 2017, Clayton was sworn in as SEC chairman on May 4, 2017 and served until December 2020, sitting also on the President's Working Group on Financial Markets, the [[Financial Stability Oversight Council]] and the [[Financial Stability Board]].[^1] On the night of June 19, 2020, while still at the SEC, he was named by Attorney General [[William Barr]] as Trump's choice to replace [[Geoffrey Berman]] as U.S. Attorney in Manhattan; Berman refused to step down, saying, "I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position, to which I was appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York," and was removed the next day.[^6]
+
+Apollo appointed Clayton its lead independent director from March 1, 2021. On March 22, 2021 it announced that he had been named non-executive chairman and that he and [[Marc Rowan]], as chief executive, succeeded Black, who stepped down citing "my wife Debra's and my health issues." Clayton said, "It is an honor to serve Apollo's investors as Chairman and further the founders' commitment to leading, shareholder-oriented governance."[^7]
+
+### U.S. Attorney in Manhattan
+
+Clayton was sworn in as interim U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York in April 2025, on appointment by the Attorney General.[^8] On August 18, 2025, as his interim term was about to expire, the judges of the district appointed "Walter J. Clayton III" United States Attorney under 28 U.S.C. § 546(d), effective August 20, "to serve until a United States Attorney, nominated by the President and appointed with the advice and consent of the United States Senate, takes office."[^9]
+
+On July 16, 2025 the office dismissed [[Maurene Comey]], a prosecutor on the Epstein and [[Ghislaine Maxwell]] cases, by an email citing "Article II of the United States Constitution." According to her lawsuit against the department, when she asked Clayton for an explanation he told her: "All I can say is it came from Washington. I can't tell you anything else."[^10]
+
+On November 14, 2025, at Trump's public request, Bondi assigned Clayton to investigate Epstein's dealings with Clinton, Summers, Hoffman and JPMorgan Chase. Five days later Trump signed the [[Epstein Files Transparency Act]], which permits the withholding of records that would jeopardize "an active federal investigation."[^3] Letters on the department's review of files under the Act were filed over Clayton's name in [[United States v. Maxwell]] on January 15 and January 31, 2026 (ECF Nos. 839 and 847).[^11]
+
+### Director of National Intelligence
+
+Trump nominated Clayton for Director of National Intelligence to fill the post vacated in June 2026 by [[Tulsi Gabbard]].[^4] At his confirmation hearing before the [[Senate Select Committee on Intelligence]] on July 15, 2026, he said, "Senator, I'm not an election denier. Joe Biden was certified as the president of the United States," but declined when pressed by Senator [[Jon Ossoff]] to say that [[Joe Biden]] had won the 2020 election. The committee chairman, [[Tom Cotton]], cited his office's cases, "including the indictment of Venezuelan dictator [[Nicolás Maduro]]." Senator [[Ron Wyden]] cited the office's "recent role in issuing subpoenas for records of [[New York Times]] journalists." The Senate confirmed him 51 to 47 on July 28, 2026.[^4][^12] He was sworn in on August 3, 2026 to oversee the eighteen agencies of the [[United States Intelligence Community|intelligence community]], saying the community's work must be "never weaponized for political motives."[^4]
+
+He was succeeded in Manhattan by Jamie McDonald, who had served as director of enforcement at the [[Commodity Futures Trading Commission]] from 2017 to 2020 and then as a partner of Sullivan & Cromwell.[^13]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, "Jay Clayton," SEC Historical Summary of Chairmen and Commissioners. https://www.sec.gov/about/sec-commissioners/sec-historical-summary-chairmen-commissioners/jay-clayton
+[^2]: ProPublica, "Jay Clayton," *Trump Town,* from his OGE Form 278e financial disclosure (database updated October 2019). https://projects.propublica.org/trump-town/staffers/jay-clayton
+[^3]: "Bondi taps acting U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton to probe Democrats' ties to Epstein," *The Washington Times,* November 14, 2025. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2025/nov/14/bondi-taps-acting-us-attorney-jay-clayton-probe-democrats-ties/ ; Epstein Files Transparency Act, Pub. L. No. 119-38, § 2(c)(1)(C), 139 Stat. 656. https://www.congress.gov/119/plaws/publ38/PLAW-119publ38.pdf
+[^4]: "Jay Clayton sworn in as U.S. director of national intelligence." *Reuters,* via *CNBC,* August 3, 2026. https://www.cnbc.com/2026/08/03/jay-clayton-sworn-in-as-us-director-of-national-intelligence.html
+[^5]: Egan, Matt. "Jay Clayton: Trump's SEC nominee to face questions over deep ties to Wall Street." *CNN Money,* March 22, 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/2017/http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/22/investing/jay-clayton-sec-hearing-wall-street-defender/index.html
+[^6]: "Geoffrey Berman, U.S. Attorney Who Prosecuted Trump Allies, Says He Won't Quit." *NPR,* June 20, 2020. https://www.npr.org/2020/06/20/881148365/geoffrey-berman-u-s-attorney-who-prosecuted-trump-allies-says-he-wont-quit ; Kimball, Spencer. "Attorney General Barr tells top Manhattan prosecutor Berman he is fired amid power struggle." *CNBC,* June 20, 2020. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/20/attorney-general-barr-tells-manhattan-us-attorney-berman-he-is-fired-amid-power-struggle.html
+[^7]: Apollo Global Management, "Marc Rowan Assumes Role of CEO of Apollo; Jay Clayton Named Non-Executive Chair of Board," press release, March 22, 2021. https://ir.apollo.com/news-events/press-releases/detail/105/marc-rowan-assumes-role-of-ceo-of-apollo
+[^8]: "Jay Clayton Appointed US Attorney for SDNY." *Yonkers Times,* April 28, 2025. https://yonkerstimes.com/jay-clayton-appointed-us-attorney-for-sdny/
+[^9]: United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, Office of the District Court Executive, Press Advisory, August 18, 2025. https://www.nysd.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/2025-08/Press%20Advisory.pdf
+[^10]: Atkins, Chloe. "Former federal prosecutor Maurene Comey sues Trump administration over her firing." *NBC News,* September 2025. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/former-federal-prosecutor-maurene-comey-sues-trump-admin-firing-rcna231406 ; Breuninger, Kevin. "Trump DOJ sued by Epstein prosecutor Maurene Comey over 'illegal' firing." *CNBC,* September 15, 2025. https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/15/trump-comey-epstein-fired.html
+[^11]: United States v. Maxwell, No. 1:20-cr-00330 (S.D.N.Y.), letters re Epstein Files Transparency Act review, ECF No. 839 (Jan. 15, 2026) and ECF No. 847 (Jan. 31, 2026). https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/17318376/united-states-v-maxwell/
+[^12]: McLaughlin, Jenna. "Senate confirms Jay Clayton as director of national intelligence." *NPR,* July 29, 2026. https://www.npr.org/2026/07/29/nx-s1-5910749/senate-confirms-jay-clayton-as-director-of-national-intelligence
+[^13]: U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, "Meet the U.S. Attorney," accessed September 25, 2026. https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/meet-us-attorney

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Jeffrey Epstein.md

@@ -236,7 +236,7 @@ The operation recruited girls, some as young as 14, to give Epstein "massages" t
 
 A March 2011 JPMorgan report quoted in later shareholder litigation stated that "MC2 Model Management and Jeffrey Epstein engaged in racketeering that involved luring in minor children for sexual play for money," that Brunel "often visited Epstein in jail," and that Epstein had paid MC2 one million dollars in 2005, "unknown if the money was given as a secret investment or payment for services as a procurer." A 2011 compliance summary recorded that "the banker said today we extended Epstein a loan in relation to this modeling agency," a JPMorgan letter of credit to MC2. Epstein's JPMorgan accounts paid nearly 1.5 million dollars to known recruiters, including MC2.[^21]
 
-The Palm Beach Police Department opened an investigation in 2005 after a parent reported that her teenage daughter had been molested, and detectives identified dozens of victims and a network of recruiters. The most prominent victim-witnesses overall include [[Virginia Giuffre]] (recruited at age 16 or 17 while working at [[Mar-a-Lago]]), Maria Farmer and her sister [[Annie Farmer]], who was abused at the New Mexico ranch in 1996, [[Courtney Wild]], and [[Sarah Ransome]]. Their accounts, depositions, and civil suits, many unsealed from the [[Giuffre v. Maxwell]] record between 2019 and 2024, provided much of the public record of the operation.[^17][^22][^23]
+The [[Palm Beach Police Department]] opened an investigation in 2005 after a parent reported that her teenage daughter had been molested, and detectives identified dozens of victims and a network of recruiters. The most prominent victim-witnesses overall include [[Virginia Giuffre]] (recruited at age 16 or 17 while working at [[Mar-a-Lago]]), Maria Farmer and her sister [[Annie Farmer]], who was abused at the New Mexico ranch in 1996, [[Courtney Wild]], and [[Sarah Ransome]]. Their accounts, depositions, and civil suits, many unsealed from the [[Giuffre v. Maxwell]] record between 2019 and 2024, provided much of the public record of the operation.[^17][^22][^23]
 
 ### The Flight Logs and the Black Book
 
@@ -264,7 +264,7 @@ Lefkowitz and co-counsel [[Kenneth Starr]] were partners at [[Kirkland & Ellis]]
 
 The prosecution team kept working on the federal case after the signing. On February 14, 2008 Villafana wrote to the FBI case agents that she had not yet sent the indictment and "was just asking for input on who to include and who to exclude." On May 16, 2008 Sloman wrote to her, "We got approved," explaining: "Alex called to tell me. He said the ltr needs to be tweaked which we'll do on Monday. I wouldn't call the FBI yet." In March 2011, JPMorgan's investment bank general counsel reported to the bank's general counsel, [[Stephen Cutler]], a former Director of Enforcement at the SEC, that Lefkowitz, who "represented Epstein in state plea/fed NPA process," believed "any pre-plea conduct is subsumed within plea/NPA"; Cutler later testified that the bank "would have seen the non-pros agreement" sometime before 2011.[^39][^40][^41]
 
-A 51-page "Epstein Investigation Timeline," marked privileged and as containing grand jury material and stamped Exhibit A-1, records the negotiation from the prosecutors' side. Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter had written to Krischer in May 2006 urging him to proceed on the probable cause affidavits or to recuse himself. In September 2007 Acosta, [[Drew Oosterbaan]], Sloman, Villafana and John McMillan met Starr, Lefkowitz and [[Lilly Ann Sanchez]]; on September 20 an internal email reported that Lefkowitz wanted to remove the registration requirement, and on September 23 Acosta told Lefkowitz to deal directly with Lourie and Villafana. On November 29, 2007 a forwarded exchange between Sloman and [[Andrew Lourie]] recorded that the defense "originally agreed to plead to the state felony that they thought was unregisterable (but did not tell us knowing we thought it was), but then discovered they were wrong and tried to get out of it. They tried several times to knock down the jail time after agreeing to the time." According to the chronology, in a telephone call in early January 2008 Lefkowitz admitted to Acosta that he had never intended Epstein to plead guilty to an offense requiring sex offender registration. After the Criminal Division rejected Epstein's appeal in May 2008, Villafana asked to indict, and Sloman and Acosta advised that Epstein would be given the chance to perform. On June 9, 2009, with Epstein on work release, she sent a memorandum titled "Request to Provide Notification of Breach," an indictment package was signed again for presentation on June 16, and on June 12 she wrote to Jack Goldberger about a violation of the agreement. The chronology ends with the formal office-wide recusal of the Southern District of Florida in July and August 2011.[^42]
+A 51-page "Epstein Investigation Timeline," marked privileged and as containing grand jury material and stamped Exhibit A-1, records the negotiation from the prosecutors' side. Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter had written to Krischer in May 2006 urging him to proceed on the probable cause affidavits or to recuse himself. In September 2007 Acosta, [[Drew Oosterbaan]], Sloman, Villafana and John McMillan met Starr, Lefkowitz and [[Lilly Ann Sanchez]]; on September 20 an internal email reported that Lefkowitz wanted to remove the registration requirement, and on September 23 Acosta told Lefkowitz to deal directly with Lourie and Villafana. On November 29, 2007 a forwarded exchange between Sloman and [[Andrew Lourie]] recorded that the defense "originally agreed to plead to the state felony that they thought was unregisterable (but did not tell us knowing we thought it was), but then discovered they were wrong and tried to get out of it. They tried several times to knock down the jail time after agreeing to the time." According to the chronology, in a telephone call in early January 2008 Lefkowitz admitted to Acosta that he had never intended Epstein to plead guilty to an offense requiring sex offender registration. After the Criminal Division rejected Epstein's appeal in May 2008, Villafana asked to indict, and Sloman and Acosta advised that Epstein would be given the chance to perform. On June 9, 2009, with Epstein on work release, she sent a memorandum titled "Request to Provide Notification of Breach," an indictment package was signed again for presentation on June 16, and on June 12 she wrote to Jack Goldberger about a violation of the agreement. The chronology ends with the formal office-wide recusal of the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida|Southern District of Florida]] in July and August 2011.[^42]
 
 Epstein served his sentence in the custody of the [[Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office]] under Sheriff [[Ric Bradshaw]], who approved him for work release. From October 2008 he spent "12 hours a day purportedly working at the '[[Florida Science Foundation]],' an entity Epstein had recently incorporated that was co-located at the West Palm Beach office of one of Epstein's attorneys." The foundation paid the sheriff's office 128,136 dollars during his incarceration, money reported to have paid off-duty deputies assigned to him while he was there; later reporting on sheriff's records described him leaving the jail up to 16 hours a day, seven days a week. In August 2019, after a letter from Bradshaw, Governor [[Ron DeSantis]] ordered the [[Florida Department of Law Enforcement]] to investigate; its May 2021 reports found no evidence that Krischer or Belohlavek "committed any crimes, accepted any bribes or gifts, or did anything improper," and found that Epstein "received differential treatment" in sheriff's custody that was not criminal.[^33][^43][^44]
 
@@ -282,7 +282,7 @@ Before the report was final, the Chief of the Public Corruption Unit of the U.S.
 
 Menchel had left the office in August 2007, weeks before the signing, for [[Kobre & Kim]]; according to reporting on the full report, he had offered the 2007 plea terms to an Epstein lawyer he had formerly dated. Epstein estate records released by the House Oversight Committee in October 2025 show appointments, calls, and dinners between Menchel and Epstein in 2011, 2013, and 2017. Menchel has said he had no business relationship with Epstein "at any point, not before, during or after my tenure," and has denied skiing with him.[^33][^52]
 
-When Ghislaine Maxwell invoked the co-conspirator clause, the [[United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit|Second Circuit]] held in 2024 that under United States v. Annabi it bound only the Southern District of Florida, noting that the circuits "have been split on this issue for decades" and that the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division had told the Office of Professional Responsibility she "played no role" in the agreement; the Supreme Court denied certiorari on October 6, 2025. None of the four named women has been charged by any district. Among the files released in 2026 is a May 6, 2020 email in which a Southern District of New York prosecutor listed the office's internal memoranda, including a co-conspirator memo delivered in the week after Epstein's death, an 86-page "co-conspirator update memo" and a 13-page "corporate prosecution memo" described as "never discussed." Groff's lawyer said she was never told she was considered a co-conspirator.[^13][^34][^53][^54]
+When Ghislaine Maxwell invoked the co-conspirator clause, the [[United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit|Second Circuit]] held in 2024 that under United States v. Annabi it bound only the Southern District of Florida, noting that the circuits "have been split on this issue for decades" and that the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division had told the Office of Professional Responsibility she "played no role" in the agreement; the Supreme Court denied certiorari on October 6, 2025. None of the four named women has been charged by any district. Among the files released in 2026 is a May 6, 2020 email in which a [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]] prosecutor listed the office's internal memoranda, including a co-conspirator memo delivered in the week after Epstein's death, an 86-page "co-conspirator update memo" and a 13-page "corporate prosecution memo" described as "never discussed." Groff's lawyer said she was never told she was considered a co-conspirator.[^13][^34][^53][^54]
 
 ### The Science Network and the Eugenics Ambition
 
@@ -362,7 +362,7 @@ The post-death litigation produced large settlements. In 2022 Epstein's estate a
 
 According to JPMorgan's 2023 filings in the territory's suit against the bank, Epstein's local affairs were managed by [[Cecile de Jongh]], the office manager of Southern Trust and the wife of Governor [[John de Jongh]] (in office 2007 to 2015), who helped Epstein shape legislation affecting sex-offender monitoring and the Economic Development Commission benefits while Epstein-linked entities paid family expenses. On the day the commission's certificate for Southern Trust was dated, January 24, 2014, Cecile de Jongh asked Epstein to match 15,000 dollars for her husband's final State of the Territory reception and asked Richard Kahn to make out a check to the "Governor's Special Events Fund." The commission's general counsel from 2007 to 2014 was [[Stacey Plaskett]], later the territory's delegate to Congress, who acknowledged receiving about 30,000 dollars in campaign contributions from Epstein and his employees. Epstein's office also handled requests from the Mapp-Potter inaugural committee (10,000 dollars from Southern Trust, December 2014), a Mapp super PAC (75,000 dollars, September 2016), and the Bryan/Roach inaugural committee (25,000 dollars requested, December 2018; payment not shown).[^11][^104][^105]
 
-The territory's later Attorney General, [[Denise George]], filed the 2020 suit against the estate and a 2022 suit against JPMorgan, and was removed by Governor Albert Bryan days after the bank suit was filed. According to FBI notes of an October 2, 2023 interview released in January 2026, George said Bryan asked her in 2019 to grant Epstein a waiver of the 21-day travel-notice rule, told her after Epstein's death "He's dead go for it," later pressed her to settle with the estate for 80 million dollars with the attorney [[Henry Smock]] as mediator, and said the estate "just wanted to clear people." Smock had assisted Epstein in the 1998 purchase of Little St. James and was counsel to the Economic Development Authority board; he later represented Bryan in a sealed 2023 divorce. Bryan's chief legal counsel, [[David Bornn]], a former employee of Epstein's attorney [[Erika Kellerhals]], called George to relay Kellerhals's question about what she was investigating. Bryan has said Epstein received no special privilege from his administration. The territory recovered about 180 million dollars after legal fees and, as of January 2026, had not filed the accounting of the money that a 2024 law requires.[^20][^106][^107]
+The territory's later Attorney General, [[Denise George]], filed the 2020 suit against the estate and a 2022 suit against JPMorgan, and was removed by Governor Albert Bryan days after the bank suit was filed. According to FBI notes of an October 2, 2023 interview released in January 2026, George said Bryan asked her in 2019 to grant Epstein a waiver of the 21-day travel-notice rule, told her after Epstein's death "He's dead go for it," later pressed her to settle with the estate for 80 million dollars with the attorney [[Henry Smock]] as mediator, and said the estate "just wanted to clear people." Smock had assisted Epstein in the 1998 purchase of Little St. James and was counsel to the [[Virgin Islands Economic Development Authority|Economic Development Authority]] board; he later represented Bryan in a sealed 2023 divorce. Bryan's chief legal counsel, [[David Bornn]], a former employee of Epstein's attorney [[Erika Kellerhals]], called George to relay Kellerhals's question about what she was investigating. Bryan has said Epstein received no special privilege from his administration. The territory recovered about 180 million dollars after legal fees and, as of January 2026, had not filed the accounting of the money that a 2024 law requires.[^20][^106][^107]
 
 ### The 2019 Federal Charges
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Julie K. Brown.md

@@ -0,0 +1,60 @@
+---
+category: "Authors & Journalists"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - JulieKBrown
+  - MiamiHerald
+  - Journalism
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - NonProsecutionAgreement
+  - GiuffreVMaxwell
+  - Unsealing
+alias:
+  - Julie Brown
+summary: "Miami Herald investigative reporter whose 2018 series Perversion of Justice prompted a Justice Department misconduct review of Epstein's plea deal and who intervened to unseal the Giuffre v. Maxwell record."
+location: "Miami, Florida"
+relations:
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Miami Herald]]"
+    role: "investigative reporter"
+    fn: 1
+  - type: investigated
+    with: "[[Epstein non-prosecution agreement]]"
+    role: "Perversion of Justice series"
+    start: 2018-11-28
+    fn: 1
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Julie K. Brown is an American investigative reporter for the *[[Miami Herald]]* whose series "Perversion of Justice," published on November 28, 2018, examined the 2007 [[Epstein non-prosecution agreement|non-prosecution agreement]] between [[Jeffrey Epstein]] and the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida]] under [[Alexander Acosta]]. The series led a [[United States]] senator to ask the [[Office of Professional Responsibility]] of the [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]] to investigate, and the office opened a review in February 2019. Brown and the Herald were also the intervenors who asked the courts to unseal the record of [[Giuffre v. Maxwell]]; the [[Second Circuit]] ruled in their favor in Brown v. Maxwell on July 3, 2019, three days before Epstein's arrest in New York.[^1][^2]
+
+### Perversion of Justice
+
+The Office of Professional Responsibility summarized the series in its November 2020 report: "The Miami Herald reported that in 2007, Acosta entered into an 'extraordinary' deal with Epstein in the form of the NPA, which permitted Epstein to avoid federal prosecution and a potentially lengthy prison sentence by pleading guilty in state court to 'two prostitution charges.' According to the Miami Herald, the government also immunized from prosecution Epstein's co-conspirators and concealed from Epstein's victims the terms of the NPA. Through its reporting, which included interviews of eight victims and information from publicly available documents, the newspaper painted a portrait of federal and state prosecutors who had ignored serious criminal conduct by a wealthy man with powerful and politically connected friends by granting him a 'deal of a lifetime.'" The report also cited a follow-up by Brown and colleagues of December 6, 2018, "Lawmakers issue call for investigation of serial sex abuser Jeffrey Epstein's plea deal."[^1]
+
+On December 3, 2018, five days after the series ran, Senator [[Ben Sasse]], chairman of the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on oversight, wrote to the Office of Professional Responsibility citing the Herald's report and asking it to "open an investigation into the instances identified in this reporting of possible misconduct by Department of Justice attorneys." The department's Office of Legislative Affairs told Sasse on February 6, 2019 that the investigation had been opened. Its November 2020 report found no professional misconduct by Acosta or four subordinates but concluded that the agreement "was a flawed mechanism for satisfying the federal interest" and that Acosta's decision "constitutes poor judgment."[^1][^3]
+
+When the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York]] announced Epstein's indictment on July 8, 2019, U.S. Attorney [[Geoffrey Berman]] said the office had been "assisted by some excellent investigative journalism." Acosta, by then [[United States Secretary of Labor|Secretary of Labor]], resigned on July 12, 2019.[^1][^4]
+
+### The Unsealing Litigation
+
+Giuffre v. Maxwell, the defamation suit brought in 2015 by [[Virginia Giuffre]] against [[Ghislaine Maxwell]] before Judge [[Robert W. Sweet]], settled on May 24, 2017 with much of its record under seal. On April 6, 2018 the Miami Herald and Brown moved to intervene and unseal the entire docket; [[Alan Dershowitz]] and the writer [[Mike Cernovich]] had earlier sought parts of the record. Sweet denied the requests.[^2]
+
+On March 11, 2019 a Second Circuit panel of Judges [[José A. Cabranes]], [[Rosemary S. Pooler]] and [[Christopher F. Droney]] issued an order to show cause, listing "Julie Brown, Miami Herald Company" among the intervenors, which stated: "Our precedent clearly establishes that 'documents submitted to a court for its consideration in a summary judgment motion are, as a matter of law, judicial documents to which a strong presumption of access attaches, under both the common law and the First Amendment.'" It ordered the parties to "show good cause why the Court should not unseal the summary judgment motion, including any materials filed in connection with this motion, and the District Court's summary judgment decision"; Pooler dissented in part. A printout of the order from [[Bloomberg Law]], time-stamped "3/11/19, 5:28 PM," is among Epstein's files released by the Justice Department.[^5]
+
+The panel ruled on July 3, 2019, in Brown v. Maxwell, that the summary judgment materials must be unsealed and that the remaining sealed filings required individualized review by the district court.[^2] About 2,000 pages were unsealed on August 9, 2019, including a 2016 deposition in which Epstein invoked his Fifth Amendment privilege; Epstein was found dead in his cell at the [[Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York|Metropolitan Correctional Center]] the next morning.[^6] On July 23, 2025, on appeals brought by Giuffre's side and by the Herald, the Second Circuit vacated the district court's December 2019 and January 2020 unsealing orders and remanded for further individualized review.[^6]
+
+### Wild v. Brown
+
+On February 3, 2022 [[Courtney Wild]] and [[Haley Robson]] sued Brown for defamation in Miami-Dade County circuit court over her 2021 book *Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story*. The complaint alleged that the book falsely described Wild as having had intercourse with Epstein after he raped her, and that Brown had minimized Wild's role in exposing the agreement and in Epstein's arrest while crediting herself; Robson alleged that after she declined an interview Brown told her she was "making the biggest mistake of your life." Brown told the *Florida Bulldog* on the day of filing that she had not yet seen the suit and had called her lawyer.[^7]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Professional Responsibility, "Investigation into the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida's Resolution of Its 2006-2008 Federal Criminal Investigation of Jeffrey Epstein and Its Interactions with Victims during the Investigation," Executive Summary, November 2020, pp. i-xi and n. 3. https://www.justice.gov/opr/page/file/1336471/dl
+[^2]: Brown v. Maxwell; Dershowitz v. Giuffre, 929 F.3d 41 (2d Cir. 2019), Nos. 18-2868, 16-3945-cv(L) (July 3, 2019). https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4636340/brown-v-maxwell-dershowitz-v-giuffre/
+[^3]: Brown, Julie K. "Perversion of Justice." *Miami Herald,* November 28, 2018. https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/article220097825.html
+[^4]: "Jeffrey Epstein operated a vast sex-trafficking network of underage girls who recruited other victims, prosecutors say." *CNN,* July 8, 2019. https://edition.cnn.com/2019/07/08/us/jeffrey-epstein-monday-court-appearance
+[^5]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00802958, DataSet 9, Bloomberg Law printout of Giuffre v. Maxwell, No. 18-2868 (2d Cir.), Order to Show Cause, March 11, 2019. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00802958.pdf
+[^6]: Giuffre v. Maxwell, 146 F.4th 165 (2d Cir. 2025) (per curiam), Nos. 24-182-cv(L), 24-203-cv(con) (July 23, 2025). https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-2nd-circuit/117500106.html
+[^7]: Complaint, *Wild and Robson v. Brown* (Fla. 11th Jud. Cir., Miami-Dade County, filed Feb. 3, 2022), paragraphs 5-13 and prayer for relief. https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/wild-brown-complaint.pdf ; "Two victims of Jeffrey Epstein sue reporter/author Julie Brown for defamation," *Florida Bulldog,* February 2022. https://www.floridabulldog.org/2022/02/two-victims-jeffrey-epstein-sue-reporter-author-julie-brown-defamation/

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Lanna Belohlavek.md

@@ -0,0 +1,70 @@
+---
+category: "Law Enforcement & Legal"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - Prosecutor
+  - PalmBeach
+  - GrandJury
+  - NonProsecutionAgreement
+alias:
+  - Lanna Belohlavek
+summary: "Palm Beach County assistant state attorney and Crimes Against Children Unit chief who presented the 2006 Epstein case to the grand jury that returned one solicitation count, later cleared by state investigators."
+location: "West Palm Beach, Florida"
+relations:
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office]]"
+    role: "Assistant State Attorney; Chief, Crimes Against Children Unit"
+    fn: 1
+  - type: prosecuted
+    with: "[[Jeffrey Epstein]]"
+    role: "lead state prosecutor"
+    start: 2006
+    fn: 2
+  - type: investigated
+    with: "[[Florida Department of Law Enforcement]]"
+    reverse: true
+    start: 2019-08
+    end: 2021-05
+    fn: 3
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Lanna Belohlavek is a Florida prosecutor who, as an Assistant State Attorney and chief of the Crimes Against Children Unit of the [[Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office]] under [[Barry Krischer]], handled the 2005 to 2006 state case against [[Jeffrey Epstein]]. She declined to file the felony charges sought by the [[Palm Beach Police Department]], offered Epstein a probationary plea that he rejected, and on July 19, 2006 presented the case to a [[Palm Beach County]] grand jury that returned a single count of felony solicitation of prostitution. In September 2007 she sat with Krischer in the joint meeting with federal prosecutors and Epstein's lawyers that preceded the [[Epstein non-prosecution agreement]]. The [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]]'s [[Office of Professional Responsibility]] interviewed her in its 2019 to 2020 review but had no jurisdiction over state officials, and the [[Florida Department of Law Enforcement]] reported in May 2021 that it had found no evidence that she or Krischer committed any crime or acted improperly.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### The State Case
+
+The police brought the Epstein case to the State Attorney's Office in 2005 without having made an arrest, and it was assigned to the Crimes Against Children Unit. Belohlavek told OPR that she and an experienced Assistant State Attorney who first worked the case with her "were at a disagreement" with the police department "over what the state . . . could ethically charge." She did not believe the evidence would satisfy the elements of the two felonies the police wanted filed, unlawful sexual activity with a minor under Florida Statute 794.05(1) and lewd and lascivious molestation under 800.04(5), and "the police were not happy with that." Victims had given contradictory statements and the original complainant had recanted her allegation of sexual contact. In April 2006 the office offered Epstein a plea to third-degree felony aggravated assault with intent to commit a felony, with adjudication withheld and five years' probation with no unsupervised contact with minors, which he rejected. She told OPR that she never considered charging procurement of a minor for prostitution, the offense Epstein later pleaded to under the federal agreement, because "the police had not presented it," and that prostitution was a misdemeanor charge and "she did not handle misdemeanors."[^2]
+
+Krischer told OPR that Epstein's local counsel brought [[Alan Dershowitz]] to see him and the Assistant State Attorney, and that Dershowitz threatened, "We're going to destroy your witnesses; don't go to court because we're going to destroy those girls." Epstein then hired [[Jack Goldberger]], with whom Krischer had "a working relationship." Because the husband of Belohlavek's colleague on the case was Goldberger's law partner, Belohlavek recused that prosecutor to remove "even the appearance of any kind of conflict" and took over the case herself. The lead police detective described the same episode to federal prosecutors in May 2006 as the defense having "orchestrated the removal of the Assistant State Attorney initially assigned to handle the matter, who was viewed as an aggressive prosecutor, by hiring a defense attorney whose relationship with the Assistant State Attorney created a conflict of interest for the prosecutor." Goldberger and the New York lawyer [[Gerald Lefcourt]] then directed their efforts at Belohlavek and Krischer, "largely by attacking the credibility of the victim witnesses."[^2][^4]
+
+Belohlavek told OPR that her office took the allegations "seriously, because . . . it was an organized scheme to involve young girls by offering them money. And I wouldn't say that we ... thought they were prostitutes ... [but] I think there was solicitation," and that although Epstein's "behavior was reprehensible, . . . I'm limited by . . . the state statutes as to what I can charge."[^2]
+
+### The Grand Jury
+
+The grand jury heard the case on July 19, 2006 in a session of under four hours, taking testimony from two police officers, an investigator from the State Attorney's Office and two of the girls. Belohlavek presented the case. When the transcript was released on July 1, 2024 by Circuit Judge [[Luis Delgado]], it showed her asking one of the teenage witnesses, "You aware that you committed a crime?" The girl answered, "Now I am. I didn't know it was a crime when I was doing it." A grand juror separately asked the girl whether she had "any idea deep down inside of you that...what you're doing is wrong?" [[Spencer Kuvin]], who represented one of the girls who testified, said after reading the transcript: "It was just atrocious the way they handled it. . . . They basically tanked their own case," and "It just reaffirmed what we always knew was happening is that the state attorney was afraid to prosecute him." The grand jury returned one count of felony solicitation of prostitution under Florida Statute 796.07, and the police department took the case to the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]].[^5][^6][^7]
+
+### Coordination with the Federal Office
+
+Belohlavek and Krischer attended a joint meeting on September 13, 2007 with federal prosecutors [[Andrew Lourie]], [[Rolando Garcia]] and [[Ann Marie Villafana|A. Marie Villafaña]] and Epstein's lawyers [[Jay Lefkowitz]], Lefcourt and Goldberger, and from September 19 to 25, 2007 they exchanged emails with the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida]] about a further meeting with Epstein's attorneys. The federal agreement signed on September 24 required Epstein to plead guilty in state court to her office's solicitation indictment and to a new information for procurement of minors for prostitution. On September 27 Villafaña wrote to Krischer and Belohlavek asking when and before which judge Epstein would plead, adding that "the agents and I would really like to be there, 'incognito.'"[^8][^9][^10]
+
+On November 16, 2007 the FBI case agents met Belohlavek and asked whether her office would oppose a request that Epstein be granted work release. According to OPR, "Belohlavek was noncommittal," and when the agents asked her to include language in the state plea agreement barring work release, she answered that she would have to discuss it with the State Attorney. Krischer later told OPR that work release was "within the control of the Sheriff's Office, not my office." The state plea agreement did not address work release, and the [[Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office]] placed Epstein on work release in October 2008.[^11]
+
+### Reviews
+
+OPR interviewed Belohlavek and Krischer among more than 60 witnesses, but stated that "because OPR does not have jurisdiction over state officials, OPR did not investigate, or reach conclusions about, their conduct regarding the state investigation." In August 2019, after a letter from Sheriff [[Ric Bradshaw]], Governor [[Ron DeSantis]] directed the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to take over the investigation of the state's handling of the case. Its May 2021 summary found no evidence that Krischer or Belohlavek "committed any crimes, accepted any bribes or gifts, or did anything improper in their handling of the case."[^1][^3]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02847284, Prior DOJ Disclosures, report, Office of Professional Responsibility, "Investigation into the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida's Resolution of Its 2006-2008 Federal Criminal Investigation of Jeffrey Epstein and Its Interactions with Victims during the Investigation," November 2020, Executive Summary pp. vi to vii, and p. 4 (EFTA02847291 to EFTA02847292, EFTA02847313). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Prior%20DOJ%20Disclosures/Memos.%20&%20Correspondence/EFTA02847284.pdf
+[^2]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02847284 (see note 1), pp. 14 to 15 and nn. 8 to 11 (EFTA02847323 to EFTA02847324).
+[^3]: Sabrina Lolo, "FDLE clears PBSO, prosecutors in connection to Epstein's work release privileges," *CBS12,* May 10, 2021. https://cbs12.com/news/local/fdle-clears-pbso-prosecutors-in-connection-to-epsteins-work-release-privileges
+[^4]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02847284 (see note 1), p. 17 (EFTA02847326).
+[^5]: James Hill, "Newly released grand jury documents in Epstein case reveal alleged victims accused of prostitution," *ABC News,* July 2, 2024. https://abcnews.com/US/newly-released-grand-jury-documents-epstein-case-reveal/story?id=111599027
+[^6]: Holly Baltz and Hannah Phillips, "Jeffrey Epstein secret transcripts: Victim was asked, Do you know 'you committed a crime?'," *Palm Beach Post* via *Yahoo News,* July 3, 2024. https://www.yahoo.com/news/jeffrey-epstein-secret-documents-just-184451449.html
+[^7]: "Judge releases Jeffrey Epstein grand jury investigation transcripts," *WUSF / Associated Press,* July 1, 2024. https://www.wusf.org/courts-law/2024-07-01/florida-judge-releases-transcripts-2006-grand-jury-investigation-jeffrey-epstein-sex-trafficking
+[^8]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00224943, DataSet 9, "Epstein Investigation Timeline," Exhibit A-1, privileged chronology of the federal investigation, May 2006 to August 2011, entry for September 13, 2007. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00224943.pdf
+[^9]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00215188, DataSet 9, emails among Barry Krischer, Lanna Belohlavek and the U.S. Attorney's Office, "RE: Meeting with Epstein's attorneys," September 19 to 25, 2007. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00215188.pdf
+[^10]: Opinion and Order, *Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2 v. United States*, No. 9:08-cv-80736-KAM (S.D. Fla. Feb. 21, 2019), ECF No. 435 (Marra, J.), reported at 359 F. Supp. 3d 1201, quoting ECF No. 407. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.flsd.317867/gov.uscourts.flsd.317867.435.0.pdf
+[^11]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02847284 (see note 1), p. 114 and n. 180 (EFTA02847423).

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Leon Black.md

@@ -123,7 +123,7 @@ A separate federal lawsuit, Doe v. Black, No. 1:23-cv-06418 in the [[Southern Di
 
 ### The Virgin Islands Settlement
 
-On January 20, 2023 Black signed a settlement agreement with the Government of the United States Virgin Islands, countersigned by Acting Attorney General [[Carol Thomas-Jacobs]], under which he paid 62.5 million dollars within sixty days to end the territory's claims against him arising from Epstein, without any admission of liability or any criminal charge. Governor [[Albert Bryan]] had removed Attorney General [[Denise George]] at the end of December 2022, days after she filed the territory's December 27, 2022 suit against JPMorgan, and appointed Thomas-Jacobs, already assigned as an attorney on the JPMorgan case, as acting attorney general effective January 1, 2023; Bryan's office gave no reason and said reports tying the removal to the suit were "not entirely accurate."[^25] The payment came shortly after the estate's own 105 million dollar settlement, while the territory's suit against JPMorgan Chase and victims' suits against JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank were pending.[^26][^27]
+On January 20, 2023 Black signed a settlement agreement with the Government of the [[U.S. Virgin Islands|United States Virgin Islands]], countersigned by Acting Attorney General [[Carol Thomas-Jacobs]], under which he paid 62.5 million dollars within sixty days to end the territory's claims against him arising from Epstein, without any admission of liability or any criminal charge. Governor [[Albert Bryan]] had removed Attorney General [[Denise George]] at the end of December 2022, days after she filed the territory's December 27, 2022 suit against JPMorgan, and appointed Thomas-Jacobs, already assigned as an attorney on the JPMorgan case, as acting attorney general effective January 1, 2023; Bryan's office gave no reason and said reports tying the removal to the suit were "not entirely accurate."[^25] The payment came shortly after the estate's own 105 million dollar settlement, while the territory's suit against JPMorgan Chase and victims' suits against JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank were pending.[^26][^27]
 
 The agreement's recitals state that "according to public reports, Black paid $158 million over approximately five years to Jeffrey Epstein's Virgin Islands company, Southern Trust," and, as a separate recital, "WHEREAS, Jeffrey Epstein used the money Black paid him to partially fund his operations in the Virgin Islands." Section III.2 provides that nothing in the agreement is an admission of liability, which Black expressly denies, and that its terms "shall not be cited by any person as evidence of wrongdoing by Black." Wyden later described the recital as an admission that Black's money funded sex trafficking. The territory directed 15 million dollars of the payment to a trust fund for counseling, mental-health and other services for Virgin Islands residents. The release covers "Leon Black, and all of his attorneys and other agents acting within the scope of their authority," and entities he owns or controls, and excludes "JP Morgan Chase or any other financial institution used by Black or Jeffrey Epstein or any current or former employees" of those institutions, and Epstein and his estate. Black agreed not to claim that his payment resolved any individual victim's claims.[^5][^9][^27]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Marc Andreessen.md

@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ The manifesto closed with a list of "patron saints of techno-optimism" that incl
 
 Andreessen and Ben Horowitz announced their endorsement of [[Donald Trump]] on their podcast on July 16, 2024, framing the shift around what they called the "Little Tech" agenda and opposition to the Biden administration's cryptocurrency and AI policy. Andreessen named the administration's proposed tax on unrealized capital gains as "the final straw," and the two each gave 2.5 million dollars to the pro-Trump super PAC Right for America, while a16z contributed tens of millions of dollars to the crypto-industry PAC Fairshake.[^4][^8]
 
-On Joe Rogan's podcast in late 2024 Andreessen claimed that more than thirty technology founders had been quietly cut off by their banks in what he called "Operation Choke Point 2.0," an assertion that Fortune and other outlets reported they could not substantiate. After the election he served as an unpaid adviser recruiting personnel for the Department of Government Efficiency run by [[Elon Musk]] and Vivek Ramaswamy, said he was spending much of his time at Mar-a-Lago, and his a16z partner Scott Kupor was named to lead the Office of Personnel Management, placing the firm alongside Thiel and [[David Sacks]] in the network that staffed the second Trump administration.[^9][^10]
+On Joe Rogan's podcast in late 2024 Andreessen claimed that more than thirty technology founders had been quietly cut off by their banks in what he called "Operation Choke Point 2.0," an assertion that Fortune and other outlets reported they could not substantiate. After the election he served as an unpaid adviser recruiting personnel for the Department of Government Efficiency run by [[Elon Musk]] and Vivek Ramaswamy, said he was spending much of his time at [[Mar-a-Lago]], and his a16z partner Scott Kupor was named to lead the Office of Personnel Management, placing the firm alongside Thiel and [[David Sacks]] in the network that staffed the second Trump administration.[^9][^10]
 
 ### Footnotes
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Maria Farmer.md

@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ In the summer of 1996 Epstein invited Farmer to spend the summer as an "artist-i
 
 NYPD complaint report No. 1996-0067241, dated August 29, 1996, records that Epstein "did call her and stated he was going to burn victim's painting" and that he "has keys to victim's apartment." The precinct told her it could address only the threat and referred her to the FBI. Farmer alleges that she then called at least two FBI offices and reported the assault, her fear that one of her minor sisters had been abused, the stolen photographs, Epstein's recording equipment, and the binder in his safe, and that the FBI hung up on her mid-sentence and did not follow up. That year Epstein had also met her younger sister [[Annie Farmer]], then sixteen, and flown her to his [[New Mexico]] ranch, where Annie later testified that Maxwell and Epstein abused her.[^1][^4]
 
-In 2006, FBI agents working the Palm Beach case arrived unannounced at Farmer's home in [[North Carolina]], acknowledged her 1996 report, and told her they needed her for the Florida investigation, promising they would "get him" this time. FBI field notes of that meeting record her earlier report to the NYPD Sixth Precinct. Farmer repeated her 1996 account. In September 2007 the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida]] had signed the non-prosecution agreement, which immunized Epstein's "potential co-conspirators."[^1][^5]
+In 2006, FBI agents working the [[Palm Beach, Florida|Palm Beach]] case arrived unannounced at Farmer's home in [[North Carolina]], acknowledged her 1996 report, and told her they needed her for the Florida investigation, promising they would "get him" this time. FBI field notes of that meeting record her earlier report to the NYPD Sixth Precinct. Farmer repeated her 1996 account. In September 2007 the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida]] had signed the non-prosecution agreement, which immunized Epstein's "potential co-conspirators."[^1][^5]
 
 ### Farmer v. United States
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Mark Epstein.md

@@ -0,0 +1,55 @@
+---
+category: "Crime & Abuse Networks"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - MarkEpstein
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - RealEstate
+  - LeslieWexner
+  - EpsteinDeath
+  - Autopsy
+alias:
+  - Mark Epstein (brother of Jeffrey Epstein)
+summary: "New York property owner and younger brother of Jeffrey Epstein, informant on his death certificate, who bought 301 East 66th Street from Leslie Wexner and hired Michael Baden to observe the autopsy."
+location: "New York, New York"
+relations:
+  - type: relative_of
+    with: "[[Jeffrey Epstein]]"
+    role: "brother"
+    fn: 1
+  - type: head_of
+    with: "[[Ossa Properties]]"
+    role: "listed as president"
+    fn: 2
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Mark Epstein is a New York property owner and the younger brother of [[Jeffrey Epstein]]. He is named as the informant, with the relationship "Brother," on the [[New York City]] death certificate issued after Jeffrey Epstein died in federal custody on August 10, 2019. Through Ossa Properties, a company once affiliated with Jeffrey Epstein's [[J. Epstein & Co.]], he owns the building at [[301 East 66th Street]] on the [[Upper East Side]] of [[Manhattan]], which he bought from [[Leslie Wexner]] in the early 1990s and in which his brother kept apartments. He retained the forensic pathologist [[Michael Baden]] to observe the autopsy.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### 301 East 66th Street
+
+Wexner, the retail executive whose fortune Jeffrey Epstein managed, sold the 16-story building at 301 East 66th Street to Mark Epstein in the early 1990s. Mark Epstein told *[[Crain's New York Business|Crain's]]* in July 2019 that he had bought it on a tip from his brother. The buyer was Ossa Properties, a former affiliate of J. Epstein & Co., of which Mark Epstein was once listed as president; its ownership changed from a partnership to a corporation by 2010. Records showed that the entity that owned Jeffrey Epstein's Manhattan townhouse, [[9 East 71st Street]], used a unit in the 66th Street building as its mailing address.[^2]
+
+Mark Epstein wrote to *[[The Wall Street Journal]]* in 2019: "Other than the obvious relationship of being brothers, the only other relationship between Jeffrey and I is as landlord/tenant." The *[[Miami Herald]]* had reported that Jeffrey Epstein housed some of his victims in individual apartments in the building, charging them 1,000 dollars a month through [[Jean-Luc Brunel]], owner of the modeling agency [[MC2 Model Management|MC2]].[^2] The interior-design firm SLK Designs of [[Sarah Kellen]], Jeffrey Epstein's former assistant, operated for a time from a Midtown Manhattan building owned by Mark Epstein.[^4]
+
+When Jeffrey Epstein sought bail after his July 2019 arrest in the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]], which was denied, Mark Epstein offered to put up a Florida condominium valued at 100,000 dollars. He had launched businesses ranging from a silk-screen T-shirt company to a modeling agency and is a donor to [[Cooper Union]], from which he graduated.[^2]
+
+### The Death Certificate
+
+On August 20, 2019, ten days after the death, [[Sigrid McCawley|Sigrid S. McCawley]] of [[Boies Schiller Flexner]] wrote to the [[Freedom of Information Act|FOIA]] Public Liaison of the [[Executive Office for United States Attorneys]] to renew eight requests, made on behalf of a client, for records on Jeffrey Epstein held by the U.S. Attorney's Offices for the District of [[New Mexico]], the Southern District of New York, the District of the Virgin Islands, the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida|Southern District of Florida]] and the Northern District of Georgia. "As Jeffrey Epstein is now deceased, any privacy concerns are extinguished," she wrote, offering to "obtain a formal death certificate to proceed." The file released by the [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]] in 2026 ends with the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene death transcript, certificate number 156-19-032838, which lists "Mark Epstein" as informant and his relationship to the decedent as "Brother."[^1]
+
+### The Autopsy and Baden
+
+Dr. [[Kristin Roman]] of the New York City [[Office of Chief Medical Examiner of the City of New York|Office of Chief Medical Examiner]] performed the autopsy on August 11, 2019 with Baden, retained by Mark Epstein, present. Chief Medical Examiner [[Barbara Sampson]] ruled the death a suicide by hanging. On October 30, 2019 Baden said that the three fractures found in Epstein's neck, two of the thyroid cartilage and one of the hyoid bone, were "extremely unusual in suicidal hangings and could occur much more commonly in homicidal strangulation"; the medical examiner's office said it stood "firmly" behind its finding.[^3][^5] Baden repeated his findings on *[[60 Minutes]]* on January 5, 2020, in a broadcast that reported Mark Epstein as the family member who had hired him.[^3]
+
+In 2025 Mark Epstein sought access to about 15 hours of unaired video interviews of his brother recorded by [[Steve Bannon]]; iMessage logs released in the [[Epstein Files|Epstein files]] record exchanges between Jeffrey Epstein and a contact named "Steve Bannon" in August 2018.[^6]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00032431, DataSet 8, letter of Sigrid S. McCawley, Boies Schiller Flexner LLP, to FOIA Public Liaison, Executive Office for United States Attorneys, August 20, 2019, with City of New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene death transcript, Certificate No. 156-19-032838 (EFTA00032431 to EFTA00032437); duplicate EFTA02751207, Court Records, Doe v. Indyke, No. 1:19-cv-08673 (S.D.N.Y.). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%208/EFTA00032431.pdf
+[^2]: Kallergis, Katherine. "These are Jeffrey Epstein's real estate ties to his brother Mark." *The Real Deal,* August 12, 2019, summarizing *The Wall Street Journal* and *Crain's New York Business.* https://therealdeal.com/national/2019/08/12/these-are-jeffrey-epsteins-real-estate-ties-to-his-brother-mark/
+[^3]: "Jeffrey Epstein's autopsy: A closer look." *CBS News, 60 Minutes,* January 5, 2020. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jeffrey-epstein-autopsy-a-closer-look-60-minutes-2020-01-05/
+[^4]: "Jeffrey Epstein's Alleged Accomplices: Where Are Sarah Kellen, Nadia Marcinkova, Adriana Ross and Lesley Groff?," *The Daily Beast.* https://www.thedailybeast.com/jeffrey-epsteins-alleged-accomplices-where-are-sarah-kellen-nadia-marcinkova-adriana-ross-and-lesley-groff/
+[^5]: "NYC medical examiner rejects claim that Jeffrey Epstein's death was a homicide." *CNN,* October 30, 2019. https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/30/us/jeffrey-epstein-autopsy-fox ; "Jeffrey Epstein autopsy finds broken bones in his neck." *CNN,* August 15, 2019. https://edition.cnn.com/2019/08/15/us/jeffrey-epstein-autopsy-broken-neck
+[^6]: "'Let me see the videotapes': Mark Epstein wants Steve Bannon's 15 hours of unseen footage of his brother," *NBC News,* 2025. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/mark-epstein-steve-bannon-15-hours-brother-jeffrey-epstein-rcna219630 ; U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA01615267, DataSet 10, iMessage log with the contact "Steve Bannon," August 23, 2018. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%2010/EFTA01615267.pdf

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Monzer Al-Kassar.md

@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@ Following the December 21, 1988, bombing of [[Pan Am Flight 103]] over [[Lockerb
 
 ### 2008 Conviction
 
-In 2007, the US [[DEA|Drug Enforcement Administration]] conducted a sting operation in which undercover agents posed as representatives of the [[FARC|Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)]] seeking weapons to kill Americans in Colombia. Al-Kassar and a co-conspirator agreed to provide weapons including anti-aircraft missiles. He was arrested in Spain in June 2007 on a US warrant and extradited. Tried in the Southern District of New York before Judge Jed Rakoff, al-Kassar was convicted in November 2008 on charges of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated terrorist organization and conspiracy to kill Americans. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison. The conviction was the result of straightforward recorded evidence from the [[DEA]]'s sting, with al-Kassar's own statements providing the primary evidence against him.[^4]
+In 2007, the US [[DEA|Drug Enforcement Administration]] conducted a sting operation in which undercover agents posed as representatives of the [[FARC|Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)]] seeking weapons to kill Americans in Colombia. Al-Kassar and a co-conspirator agreed to provide weapons including anti-aircraft missiles. He was arrested in Spain in June 2007 on a US warrant and extradited. Tried in the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]] before [[Jed Rakoff|Judge Jed Rakoff]], al-Kassar was convicted in November 2008 on charges of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated terrorist organization and conspiracy to kill Americans. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison. The conviction was the result of straightforward recorded evidence from the [[DEA]]'s sting, with al-Kassar's own statements providing the primary evidence against him.[^4]
 
 ### Footnotes
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Paul Cassell.md

@@ -0,0 +1,85 @@
+---
+category: "Law Enforcement & Legal"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - PaulCassell
+  - Lawyer
+  - FederalJudge
+  - VictimsRights
+  - CrimeVictimsRightsAct
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - UniversityOfUtah
+alias:
+  - Paul G. Cassell
+  - Paul George Cassell
+  - Judge Paul Cassell
+  - Paul Cassell
+summary: "Utah law professor, former Reagan Justice Department official and former federal judge who, after leaving the bench in 2007, represented Epstein's victims in the Crime Victims' Rights Act case against the United States."
+born: 1959
+location: "Salt Lake City, Utah"
+relations:
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Department of Justice]]"
+    role: "Associate Deputy Attorney General"
+    start: 1986
+    end: 1988
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia]]"
+    role: "Assistant U.S. Attorney"
+    start: 1988
+    end: 1991
+    fn: 1
+  - type: appointed
+    with: "[[George W. Bush]]"
+    reverse: true
+    role: "U.S. District Judge, District of Utah"
+    start: 2002-05-15
+    end: 2007-11-05
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[University of Utah College of Law]]"
+    role: "professor of law"
+    start: 1992
+    fn: 1
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Paul G. Cassell (born 1959, in [[Orange, California]]) is an American law professor at the [[University of Utah College of Law]], a former Associate Deputy Attorney General in the [[Ronald Reagan|Reagan]] [[Department of Justice]], and a former judge of the [[United States District Court for the District of Utah]], appointed by [[George W. Bush]], who resigned from the bench in November 2007. He then became co-counsel with [[Bradley Edwards]] for victims of [[Jeffrey Epstein]] in [[Doe v. United States]], the [[Crime Victims' Rights Act]] case over the [[Epstein non-prosecution agreement]], and in related civil litigation, and was sued for defamation by [[Alan Dershowitz]] after a December 2014 filing in that case.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### Career
+
+Cassell graduated from [[Stanford University]] in 1979 and from [[Stanford Law School]] in 1984. He clerked for Judge [[Antonin Scalia]] on the [[United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit|D.C. Circuit]] from 1984 to 1985 and for Chief Justice [[Warren E. Burger]] from 1985 to 1986. He was an Associate Deputy Attorney General from 1986 to 1988 and an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the [[Eastern District of Virginia]] from 1988 to 1991, and taught at the University of Utah from 1992 to 2002. Bush nominated him to the federal bench on June 19, 2001, without Senate action, and again on September 4, 2001, to the seat vacated by David Sam; he was confirmed on May 13, 2002 and commissioned on May 15, 2002. His service ended by resignation on November 5, 2007, and he returned to the Utah faculty.[^1]
+
+### Doe v. United States
+
+On July 7, 2008 Edwards filed the emergency petition of the victim then known as Jane Doe 1, later identified as [[Courtney Wild]], to enforce her rights under 18 U.S.C. 3771, before Judge [[Kenneth Marra]] in [[West Palm Beach, Florida|West Palm Beach]]. On July 28, 2008, three weeks after the filing and less than nine months after leaving the bench, Cassell moved for a limited appearance for the petitioners, which Marra granted the next day; the Jacksonville lawyer [[Jay Howell]] followed on August 8. Edwards litigated the case without fee for more than ten years. Marra held in 2011 that the Act's rights attach before formal charges and in 2013 that it authorizes rescission of a prosecutorial agreement reached in violation of the conferral right. On February 21, 2019 he granted partial summary judgment, finding that "[p]articularly problematic was the Government's decision to conceal the existence of the NPA and mislead the victims to believe that federal prosecution was still a possibility," and on September 16, 2019, after Epstein's death, he denied every remedy the petitioners sought. On April 15, 2021 the en banc [[United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit|Eleventh Circuit]] held seven to four that the Act gave Wild no freestanding pre-charge action, and on February 22, 2022 the [[Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court]] denied certiorari.[^2][^4][^5]
+
+### The Jane Doe 3 Filing and the Dershowitz Litigation
+
+In December 2014 Edwards and Cassell moved in the Crime Victims' Rights Act case to add a client identified as Jane Doe 3, later publicly identified as [[Virginia Giuffre]], alleging that Epstein had trafficked her as a minor to Dershowitz, among others. Dershowitz said he had never met her, called the accusation fabricated, and said the two lawyers should be disbarred. In April 2015 Marra struck the allegations as "immaterial and impertinent" to the case without ruling on their truth. Edwards and Cassell sued Dershowitz for defamation, and he countersued.[^3][^6]
+
+The suits settled on April 8, 2016. In a joint statement issued through the mediator, "Edwards and Cassell acknowledge that it was a mistake to have filed sexual misconduct accusations against Dershowitz," and Dershowitz withdrew his accusations that they had acted unethically. The statement said the dispute concerned the lawyers' due diligence and "not whether the acts of alleged misconduct in fact occurred," and that the withdrawal was not an acknowledgment that Giuffre's allegations were mistaken; Giuffre, not a party, stood by them at the time. Dershowitz required that the financial terms remain confidential. Giuffre withdrew her allegation against Dershowitz in a separate 2022 settlement, saying she "may have made a mistake."[^3][^6]
+
+### Epstein v. Rothstein
+
+In the [[Palm Beach County]] suit Epstein brought in 2009 against [[Scott Rothstein]] and Edwards, which became Edwards's counterclaim for malicious prosecution, Cassell and Howell appeared as limited intervenor co-counsel for three of Epstein's victims. On November 9, 2018 Epstein, through counsel including [[Jack Goldberger]], moved for in camera inspection of 302 emails that the other side had withheld on a 1,607-entry, 159-page privilege log. The motion argued that only 19 entries were communications with a client, that "the majority of the documents are e-mails among attorneys and staff" and "with media sources," and that Cassell and his co-counsel had "very significant personal and professional reas[ons]" for not wanting the emails "to see the light of the courtroom," quoting the line that sunlight "is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman." Epstein settled the counterclaim in December 2018 with a written apology to Edwards.[^7][^8]
+
+On May 2, 2023 Judge [[Jed Rakoff]] admitted Cassell pro hac vice in Jane Doe 1's class suit against [[JPMorgan Chase]] in the [[U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]], consolidated for pretrial purposes with [[Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank]]; JPMorgan settled the class claims in June 2023 for 290 million dollars.[^9][^10]
+
+On February 25, 2018 Epstein had written to [[Kathryn Ruemmler]], the former [[White House]] Counsel, about an "email trail" involving Rothstein's lawyer and prosecutors: "now the issue is how to use, it, CVRA? marie? Bar. USA[?]. . . . Judge marra, cvra.? press? move f[o]r sanctions? strategy time." Ruemmler replied the next morning: "How did you discover it? Let's discuss in the a.m."[^11]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: Federal Judicial Center, "Cassell, Paul G.," Biographical Directory of Article III Federal Judges. https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/cassell-paul-g
+[^2]: Opinion and Order, *Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2 v. United States*, No. 9:08-cv-80736-KAM (S.D. Fla. Feb. 21, 2019), ECF No. 435 (Marra, J.), reported at 359 F. Supp. 3d 1201, at 17-21, 26-33, citing *Does v. United States*, 817 F. Supp. 2d 1337 (S.D. Fla. 2011), and *Doe v. United States*, 950 F. Supp. 2d 1262 (S.D. Fla. 2013). https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.flsd.317867/gov.uscourts.flsd.317867.435.0.pdf ; docket, ECF Nos. 16, 18, 20, 21: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/4502088/doe-v-united-states/
+[^3]: "Lawyers Call Sexual Misconduct Case Against Dershowitz 'A Mistake,'" *The Harvard Crimson,* April 11, 2016. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/4/11/lawyers-drop-dershowitz-case/ ; "Settlement Reached In Litigation Between Alan Dershowitz, Paul Cassell, And Bradley Edwards," *Above the Law,* April 2016. https://abovethelaw.com/2016/04/settlement-reached-in-litigation-between-alan-dershowitz-paul-cassell-and-bradley-edwards/
+[^4]: Opinion and Order, *Doe v. United States*, No. 9:08-cv-80736-KAM (S.D. Fla. Sept. 16, 2019), ECF No. 478 (Marra, J.). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/USCOURTS-flsd-9_08-cv-80736/pdf/USCOURTS-flsd-9_08-cv-80736-2.pdf
+[^5]: *In re Wild*, No. 19-13843, 994 F.3d 1244 (11th Cir. Apr. 15, 2021) (en banc). https://media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/files/201913843.enb.pdf ; Supreme Court of the United States, docket No. 21-351, order of February 22, 2022 denying certiorari. https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/21-351.html
+[^6]: "Virginia Giuffre drops allegations against Alan Dershowitz, saying she 'may have made a mistake,'" *CNN,* November 8, 2022. https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/08/us/alan-dershowitz-virginia-giuffre-allegations-dropped
+[^7]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02768436, Court Records (Epstein v. Rothstein, No. 50-2009-CA-040800-XXXX-MB (Fla. 15th Cir. Ct. 2009)), Counter-Defendant Jeffrey Epstein's Motion for an In Camera Inspection of E-mails, e-filed November 9, 2018, pp. 1, 3, 17, 21, with privilege log. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Court%20Records/Epstein%20v.%20Rothstein%2C%20No.%2050-2009-CA-040800-XXXX-MB%20(Fla.%2015th%20Cir.%20Ct.%202009)/EFTA02768436.pdf
+[^8]: "Millionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein apologizes in settling malicious prosecution suit," *CNN,* December 4, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/04/politics/jeffrey-epstein-lawsuit-settled
+[^9]: Docket, Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.), ECF No. 131 (May 2, 2023), order granting motion of Paul G. Cassell to appear pro hac vice in No. 1:22-cv-10019-JSR, CourtListener docket 66683865. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/66683865/government-of-the-united-states-virgin-islands-v-jpmorgan-chase-bank-na/
+[^10]: "JPMorgan Chase and Epstein survivor Jane Doe 1 reach $290 million settlement," *NPR,* June 12, 2023. https://www.npr.org/2023/06/12/1181675580/epstein-jane-doe-1-290-million-settlement-jpmorgan-chase
+[^11]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02522534, DataSet 11, email chain, Jeffrey Epstein and Kathy Ruemmler, "Re: this email trail was discovered today," February 25 to 26, 2018. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%2011/EFTA02522534.pdf

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Paul Engelmayer.md

@@ -0,0 +1,72 @@
+---
+category: "Law Enforcement & Legal"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - PaulEngelmayer
+  - FederalJudge
+  - SouthernDistrictOfNewYork
+  - GhislaineMaxwell
+  - EpsteinFilesTransparencyAct
+  - GrandJury
+  - TreasuryDepartment
+alias:
+  - Paul A. Engelmayer
+  - Paul Adam Engelmayer
+  - Judge Engelmayer
+  - Paul Engelmayer
+summary: "Manhattan federal judge and former Thurgood Marshall clerk and Major Crimes chief who inherited Ghislaine Maxwell's closed criminal case and ruled on its grand jury record under the Epstein Files Transparency Act."
+born: 1961
+location: "New York, New York"
+relations:
+  - type: appointed
+    with: "[[Barack Obama]]"
+    reverse: true
+    role: "U.S. District Judge, Southern District of New York"
+    start: 2011-07-27
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York]]"
+    role: "Assistant U.S. Attorney; chief, Major Crimes Unit"
+    start: 1989
+    end: 1999
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Office of the Solicitor General]]"
+    role: "Assistant to the Solicitor General"
+    start: 1994
+    end: 1996
+    fn: 1
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Paul A. Engelmayer (born 1961, in [[New York City]]) is a judge of the [[U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York]], appointed by [[Barack Obama]] in 2011, who earlier clerked for Justice [[Thurgood Marshall]], served in the [[Office of the Solicitor General]] and headed the Major Crimes Unit of the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office]]. He took over [[United States v. Maxwell]], the criminal case of [[Ghislaine Maxwell]], after Judge [[Alison Nathan]] was elevated to the [[Second Circuit]], and in 2025 and 2026 ruled on the unsealing of its grand jury record, first refusing the request of Deputy Attorney General [[Todd Blanche]] and then granting it under the [[Epstein Files Transparency Act]]. In February 2025, sitting in emergency Part I, he barred political appointees and special government employees from Treasury payment systems.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### Career
+
+Engelmayer graduated from [[Harvard College]] in 1983 and [[Harvard Law School]] in 1987, after working as a reporter for the [[Wall Street Journal]] in New York in 1983 and 1984. He clerked for Judge [[Patricia Wald|Patricia M. Wald]] of the [[United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit|D.C. Circuit]] from 1987 to 1988 and for Justice Marshall from 1988 to 1989. He was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York from 1989 to 1994 and 1996 to 1999, as deputy chief appellate attorney in 1994 and chief of the Major Crimes Unit from 1996 to 1999, and Assistant to the Solicitor General from 1994 to 1996. He was in private practice in New York from 2000 to 2011. Obama nominated him on February 2, 2011 to the seat vacated by [[Gerard E. Lynch]]; he was confirmed on July 26 and commissioned on July 27, 2011.[^1]
+
+### Leon Black's Racketeering Suit
+
+In 2022 Engelmayer dismissed with prejudice a racketeering suit by the financier [[Leon Black]], who had left [[Apollo Global Management]] after the disclosure of his payments to [[Jeffrey Epstein]], against his Apollo co-founder Josh Harris, [[Guzel Ganieva]] and others, calling the claims "glaringly deficient in fundamental respects."[^4]
+
+### The Maxwell Grand Jury Record
+
+On July 18, 2025 Blanche, formerly [[Donald Trump]]'s personal criminal defense lawyer, entered an appearance for the [[United States]] in Maxwell's closed case and moved to unseal the grand jury transcripts (ECF Nos. 784, 785); he questioned Maxwell under limited immunity on July 24 and 25. On August 11, 2025 Engelmayer denied the motion (ECF No. 809, 794 F. Supp. 3d 215), holding that Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e) barred disclosure and that "[t]he Government's invocation of special circumstances . . . fails at the threshold." Judge [[Richard M. Berman]] relied on the ruling nine days later in denying the government's parallel motion in [[United States v. Epstein]].[^2][^5]
+
+After the Epstein Files Transparency Act became law on November 19, 2025, the government renewed the motion (ECF No. 810). Engelmayer ordered victim submissions through a dedicated [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]] mailbox, docketed three redacted victim letters, and on December 9, 2025 granted the motion and modified the 2020 protective order, subject to the Act's protection of victims' identities (ECF No. 820). Berman granted the matching motion in the Epstein docket the next day.[^2][^5]
+
+On January 13, 2026 Representatives [[Thomas Massie]] and [[Ro Khanna]], the Act's sponsors, asked Engelmayer to appoint "a special master or independent monitor" over the Justice Department's compliance, reporting that as of January 5 it had "publicly released only 12,285 documents" of "more than 2 million documents potentially responsive to the Act," and that "DOJ cannot be trusted with making mandatory disclosures under the Act." Victim letters, including one from [[Haley Robson]] transmitted by the government, were cited in support. He denied the motion on January 21, 2026 (ECF No. 844): "This federal criminal case does not give the Court jurisdiction over, or authority to supervise, DOJ's compliance with the EFTA, a civil records-disclosure statute." Amici, he held, may not raise issues no party has pursued; his December ruling had removed the protective order as an obstacle, but "[i]t was the EFTA that" required release. He described the case as "effectively closed," with Maxwell's pro se motion under 28 U.S.C. 2255 "the only outstanding item." Status letters on the Department's review followed over the name of U.S. Attorney [[Jay Clayton]].[^6]
+
+### The Treasury Order
+
+On the evening of February 8, 2025, "sitting in its Part I capacity," Engelmayer received the application of the attorneys general of 19 states, led by New York, for a temporary restraining order against a Treasury policy that expanded access to the payment systems of the [[Bureau of the Fiscal Service]] to political appointees and "special government employees." Finding that the states faced irreparable harm from "the risk that the new policy presents of the disclosure of sensitive and confidential information and the heightened risk that the systems in question will be more vulnerable than before to hacking," and that their statutory claims presented "as particularly strong," he restrained the defendants from granting access to Treasury payment records and systems except to civil servants who had passed background checks and security clearances, and ordered anyone else given access since January 20 "to immediately destroy any and all copies of material downloaded from the Treasury Department's records and systems, if any." The case was assigned the same evening to Judge Jeannette A. Vargas.[^3]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: Federal Judicial Center, "Engelmayer, Paul Adam," Biographical Directory of Article III Federal Judges. https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/engelmayer-paul-adam
+[^2]: United States v. Maxwell, No. 1:20-cr-00330 (S.D.N.Y.), ECF Nos. 784, 785 (July 18, 2025); Opinion and Order, ECF No. 809 (Aug. 11, 2025), reported at 794 F. Supp. 3d 215, 225-29; ECF Nos. 810, 811, 818; Opinion and Order, ECF No. 820 (Dec. 9, 2025), 2025 WL 3522378. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/17318376/united-states-v-maxwell/
+[^3]: Order, State of New York et al. v. Trump et al., No. 25 Civ. 1144 (JAV) (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 8, 2025), ECF No. 6 (Engelmayer, J., sitting in Part I). https://nysd.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/2025-02/25cv1144%20Order%20on%20TRO%202%208%2025_0.pdf
+[^4]: "Leon Black's Lawsuit Against Josh Harris, Guzel Ganieva Dismissed by Judge," *Bloomberg,* June 30, 2022. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-30/leon-black-suit-against-josh-harris-guzel-ganieva-thrown-out
+[^5]: United States v. Epstein, No. 1:19-cr-00490 (S.D.N.Y.), Decision and Order, ECF No. 77 (Aug. 20, 2025), quoting United States v. Maxwell, 2025 WL 2301281, at *9 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 11, 2025); Decision and Order, ECF No. 92 (Dec. 10, 2025), CourtListener docket 15887848. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/15887848/united-states-v-epstein/
+[^6]: United States v. Maxwell, No. 20 Cr. 330 (PAE) (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 21, 2026), Opinion and Order, ECF No. 844, denying motion of Reps. Massie and Khanna (ECF Nos. 837, 838). https://www.nysd.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/2026-01/Maxwell%2020cr330%20-%20Opinion%20%26%20Order%201.21.26.pdf ; United States v. Maxwell, No. 1:20-cr-00330 (S.D.N.Y.), ECF Nos. 839, 843, 847. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/17318376/united-states-v-maxwell/

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Richard M. Berman.md

@@ -0,0 +1,92 @@
+---
+category: "Law Enforcement & Legal"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - RichardMBerman
+  - FederalJudge
+  - SouthernDistrictOfNewYork
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - Halkbank
+  - EpsteinFilesTransparencyAct
+alias:
+  - Richard Berman
+  - Judge Richard M. Berman
+  - Judge Berman
+  - Richard M. Berman
+summary: "Manhattan federal judge, a former Javits aide and Warner Cable general counsel, who ordered Jeffrey Epstein detained in 2019, let victims speak before dismissing his indictment, and later unsealed its grand jury record."
+born: 1943
+location: "New York, New York"
+relations:
+  - type: appointed
+    with: "[[Bill Clinton]]"
+    reverse: true
+    role: "U.S. District Judge, Southern District of New York"
+    start: 1998-10-22
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Jacob Javits]]"
+    role: "executive assistant to the senator"
+    start: 1974
+    end: 1977
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Warner Cable]]"
+    role: "general counsel and executive vice president"
+    start: 1978
+    end: 1986
+    fn: 1
+  - type: participant_in
+    with: "[[United States v. Epstein]]"
+    role: "presiding judge"
+    start: 2019-07-02
+    fn: 2
+  - type: participant_in
+    with: "[[United States v. Halkbank]]"
+    role: "presiding judge"
+    start: 2019
+    fn: 9
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Richard M. Berman (born 1943, in [[New York City]]) is a senior judge of the [[U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York]], appointed by [[Bill Clinton]] in 1998. He presided over [[United States v. Epstein]], the 2019 sex-trafficking indictment of [[Jeffrey Epstein]], ordering Epstein detained on July 18, 2019 and, after Epstein's death in federal custody, holding a public hearing on August 27, 2019 at which victims spoke before he dismissed the indictment. In 2025 he first refused and then, after the [[Epstein Files Transparency Act]], granted the government's motions to unseal the case's grand jury record. He also presided over the Iran-sanctions prosecution of the Turkish state-owned bank [[Halkbank]]. He is not related to [[Geoffrey Berman]], the U.S. Attorney whose office brought the Epstein case.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### Career
+
+Berman graduated from [[Cornell University]] in 1964 and the [[New York University School of Law]] in 1967, and in 1996, while in private practice, earned a master's degree in social work from the [[Fordham University]] Graduate School of Social Services. He practiced in New York from 1970 to 1974, was executive assistant to Senator [[Jacob Javits]] of New York from 1974 to 1977, executive director of the New York State Alliance to Save Energy from 1977 to 1978, and general counsel and executive vice president of [[Warner Cable]] from 1978 to 1986. After further private practice he sat as a judge of the Queens County Family Court from 1995 to 1998. Clinton nominated him on May 21, 1998 to the seat vacated by [[Kevin Thomas Duffy]]; he was confirmed on October 21 and commissioned on October 22, 1998, and took senior status on September 11, 2011.[^1]
+
+In 2001 Berman warned [[Steven Hoffenberg]], the former chief executive of [[Towers Financial Corporation]], that "he may not assert baseless claims or abuse the judicial process through the instigation of frivolous or duplicative suits"; a 2018 draft memorandum by Epstein's lawyers at [[Troutman Sanders]] quoted the warning under the heading "Multiple SDNY Judges Warned the Person Driving This Action Against Such Frivolous Lawsuits."[^4]
+
+### United States v. Epstein
+
+A grand jury in the Southern District returned a sealed two-count indictment on July 2, 2019, unsealed on July 8 after Epstein's arrest at [[Teterboro Airport]]. On July 16 Assistant U.S. Attorney Alison Moe filed a supplement to the government's detention memorandum disclosing that in late 2018, days after the [[Miami Herald]] began its series on the case, Epstein had wired 100,000 dollars and 250,000 dollars to two individuals named as potential co-conspirators in the 2007 [[Epstein non-prosecution agreement]], identified only as Individual-1 and Individual-2. On July 18, 2019 Berman granted the government's motion for remand and denied release (ECF No. 32), finding Epstein a danger to the community and a flight risk.[^2][^5]
+
+Epstein was found dead in the [[Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York|Metropolitan Correctional Center]] on August 10, 2019, and on August 19 the U.S. Attorney asked the court to approve an order of nolle prosequi. Berman convened a public hearing on August 27. Appearing were Assistant U.S. Attorneys [[Maurene Comey]] and Alison Moe, defense counsel Reid Weingarten and [[Martin Weinberg]], an [[Federal Bureau of Investigation|FBI]] special agent and an NYPD detective. Berman said that "Mr. Epstein's death obviously means that a trial in which he is a defendant cannot take place," and answered a [[New York Law Journal]] opinion article by two professors arguing against such a hearing: "I respectfully disagree with the Law Journal[.] . . . [P]ublic hearings promote transparency and they provide the court with insights and information which the court may not otherwise be aware of." He described Rule 48(a) as "clearly directed toward an independent judicial assessment of the public interest in dismissing the indictment," and said it was "required that the court consider the views of the victims in the case at the hearing." He observed that "one of the authors of that article is himself counsel in one of the Epstein-related cases" and that he was surprised this was not disclosed. More than a dozen victims spoke, some through their lawyers. On August 29, 2019 Berman signed the order of nolle prosequi (ECF No. 52). On August 30 Professor Bruce A. Green of [[Fordham University School of Law]] wrote to Berman to "clarify the record" after reading a partial transcript, and Berman thanked him on September 4.[^2][^6]
+
+In June 2023 an expert report for the [[Government of the United States Virgin Islands]] in its suit against [[JPMorgan Chase]] cited the transcript of the August 27 hearing among its sources.[^7]
+
+### Criticism of the Justice Department
+
+On May 6, 2020 staff of the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York]] circulated among themselves a news report of "Judge Berman commenting, in the middle of a random fraud sentencing, on his objections to DOJ policies and investigations post-Epstein," linking a New York Daily News story on Berman, Attorney General [[William Barr]] and the [[Federal Bureau of Prisons|Bureau of Prisons]]; an earlier message in the chain forwarded a New York Law Journal article on [[Prince Andrew]]'s non-cooperation with prosecutors "for awareness given that this is an ongoing issue."[^8]
+
+### The Grand Jury Record
+
+On July 18, 2025 Deputy Attorney General [[Todd Blanche]] entered an appearance in the closed Epstein case and moved to unseal its grand jury transcripts (ECF Nos. 60, 61), the same day he filed the matching motion in [[United States v. Maxwell]]. After reviewing the 70 pages of transcripts of June 18 and July 2, 2019, the exhibits (a PowerPoint presentation and four pages of call logs), letters from victims and their lawyers and a letter from the executors of Epstein's estate, Berman denied the motion on August 20, 2025 (ECF No. 77). He held that Rule 6(e) governed, that "there is clear precedent and sound purpose for grand jury sealing," and that the government "fails to demonstrate any 'special circumstance[]' which might justify unsealing," quoting Judge [[Paul Engelmayer]]'s ruling of August 11 in the Maxwell case and the Second Circuit's statement that grand jury secrecy is a tradition "older than our Nation itself." On September 16, 2025 he denied an application by NBC News to unseal the names of Individual-1 and Individual-2 (ECF No. 82).[^2][^3]
+
+After the Epstein Files Transparency Act became law, the government renewed its motion on November 24, 2025, and on December 10, one day after Engelmayer's parallel ruling, Berman granted it (ECF No. 92): "The recently enacted 'Epstein Files Transparency Act,' Pub. L. No. 119-38, 139 Stat. 656 (2025) . . . compels the US [[Department of Justice]] . . . to make public by December 19, 2025 certain evidentiary files. The Court hereby grants the Government's motion in accordance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act and with the un[e]qivocal right of Epstein victims to have their identity and privacy protected." From January 15 to February 5, 2026 U.S. Attorney [[Jay Clayton]] sent him a series of letters on the Department's review and compliance. On January 23 Berman answered a letter from [[Haley Robson]], transmitted by the government, that there was "no relevant case on my docket at this time." On February 1 the victims' lawyer [[Brittany Henderson]] sent Berman and Engelmayer an emergency request for judicial intervention under the Act; Berman set a conference, which he cancelled on February 3 after the parties resolved the privacy issues.[^3]
+
+### Halkbank
+
+In 2019 the [[United States]] indicted Türkiye Halk Bankası, a bank majority-owned through the Turkish Wealth Fund by the Republic of [[Turkey]], for a multi-year conspiracy to evade sanctions on [[Iran]]; the indictment alleged that the bank, "with the assistance of high-ranking Turkish government officials, laundered billions of dollars of Iranian oil and gas proceeds through the global financial system." The prosecution proceeded before Berman in the case captioned United States v. Zarrab. On October 1, 2020 he denied Halkbank's motion to dismiss, reasoning that the [[Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act]] "does not appear to grant immunity in criminal proceedings." The Second Circuit affirmed on October 22, 2021 (16 F.4th 336), and on April 19, 2023 the [[Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court]] held that the Act does not apply to criminal cases but remanded on common-law immunity, Justice [[Neil Gorsuch]] writing in partial dissent that the decision "overcomplicates the law for no good reason." The Second Circuit ruled again on October 22, 2024 (120 F.4th 41).[^9]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: Federal Judicial Center, "Berman, Richard M.," Biographical Directory of Article III Federal Judges. https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/berman-richard-m
+[^2]: United States v. Epstein, No. 1:19-cr-00490-RMB (S.D.N.Y.), ECF Nos. 2, 3, 32 (July 18, 2019), 52 (Aug. 29, 2019), 55, 56, 77 (Aug. 20, 2025), 82 (Sept. 16, 2025), CourtListener docket 15887848. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/15887848/united-states-v-epstein/
+[^3]: United States v. Epstein, No. 1:19-cr-00490-RMB (S.D.N.Y.), ECF Nos. 60, 61, 75, 77, 85, 92 (Dec. 10, 2025), 94-105 (Jan. 15 to Feb. 5, 2026), CourtListener docket 15887848. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/15887848/united-states-v-epstein/
+[^4]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00802452, DataSet 9, draft memorandum of law, Defendants' Memorandum of Law in Support of Their Motion to Dismiss, Gerber v. The Financial Trust Company, No. 1:18-cv-07580-JPO (S.D.N.Y.), Troutman Sanders LLP, September 2018. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00802452.pdf
+[^5]: United States v. Epstein, No. 1:19-cr-00490-RMB (S.D.N.Y.), ECF No. 23, Letter from AUSA Alison Moe to Judge Richard M. Berman (Supplement to Detention Memorandum), July 16, 2019, pp. 1-3. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.518649/gov.uscourts.nysd.518649.23.0_2.pdf ; U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, Report 23-085, June 2023, pp. iii to iv. https://oig.justice.gov/sites/default/files/reports/23-085.pdf
+[^6]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02733081, Court Records (CA Florida Holdings, LLC, Publisher of the Palm Beach Post v. Aronberg, No. 50-2019-CA-014681-XXXX-MB (Fla. 15th Cir. Ct. 2019)), appendix item 11, transcript of hearing, United States v. Jeffrey Epstein, 19 Cr. 490 (RMB) (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 27, 2019), beginning at EFTA02733613. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Court%20Records/CA%20Florida%20Holdings%2C%20LLC%2C%20Publisher%20of%20the%20Palm%20Beach%20Post%20v.%20Aronberg%2C%20No.%2050-2019-CA-014681-XXXX-MB%20(Fla.%2015th%20Cir.%20Ct.%202019)/EFTA02733081.pdf
+[^7]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA02810827, Court Records (Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904), Expert Report of Jorge Amador, June 16, 2023, Document 238-31, n. 53. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank%2C%20N.A.%2C%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/EFTA02810827.pdf
+[^8]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00030338, DataSet 8, internal U.S. Attorney's Office email chain, "RE: The Prince and the Proffer | New York Law Journal," May 6, 2020. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%208/EFTA00030338.pdf ; duplicate at EFTA00018735. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%208/EFTA00018735.pdf
+[^9]: Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S. v. United States, No. 21-1450, 598 U.S. 264 (April 19, 2023), slip op. at 1-3, and Gorsuch, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part. https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-1450_5468.pdf ; United States v. Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S., No. 20-3499, 16 F.4th 336 (2d Cir. Oct. 22, 2021), on appeal from the Decision and Order of Oct. 1, 2020 (Berman, J.). https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5291813/united-states-v-bankasi/ ; United States v. Zarrab (Turkiye Halk Bankasi), No. 20-3499, 120 F.4th 41 (2d Cir. Oct. 22, 2024). https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/10152619/united-states-v-zarrab-turkiye-halk-bankasi/

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Sam Bankman-Fried.md

@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ The Future Fund launched in February 2022, run by [[Nick Beckstead]], [[Leopold
 
 ### The Collapse and Conviction
 
-FTX collapsed in November 2022 when it could not meet customer withdrawals, revealing that roughly eight billion dollars in customer deposits had been diverted to Alameda Research. Bankman-Fried was arrested, extradited, and tried in the Southern District of New York, where a jury convicted him on November 2, 2023; he was sentenced in March 2024 to twenty-five years in prison. The fraud destroyed the effective-altruism movement's largest funding source and discredited its public standing, accelerating the distancing from the label by figures including Anthropic's [[Dario Amodei]] and contributing to the climate in which the Future of Humanity Institute was closed.[^1][^4]
+FTX collapsed in November 2022 when it could not meet customer withdrawals, revealing that roughly eight billion dollars in customer deposits had been diverted to Alameda Research. Bankman-Fried was arrested, extradited, and tried in the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]], where a jury convicted him on November 2, 2023; he was sentenced in March 2024 to twenty-five years in prison. The fraud destroyed the effective-altruism movement's largest funding source and discredited its public standing, accelerating the distancing from the label by figures including Anthropic's [[Dario Amodei]] and contributing to the climate in which the Future of Humanity Institute was closed.[^1][^4]
 
 Judge Lewis Kaplan handed down the sentence on March 28, 2024 and ordered forfeiture of 11.02 billion dollars; prosecutors had sought 40 to 50 years against a statutory maximum of 110, while the defense had argued for about six and a half. Several of his closest associates pleaded guilty and testified against him, including Alameda chief [[Caroline Ellison]], FTX cofounder [[Gary Wang]], and engineering head [[Nishad Singh]]. The bankruptcy estate, led by restructuring executive [[John J. Ray III]], recovered enough through asset sales (including the Anthropic stake and a rebound in crypto prices) to plan repayment of creditors at full claim value plus interest, while pursuing clawbacks against grant recipients; the effective-altruism umbrella body [[Effective Ventures]] returned 26,786,503 dollars to the estate in 2024, the full sum it had received from FTX.[^7][^8]
 

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Vincent Frazer.md

@@ -0,0 +1,67 @@
+---
+category: "Law Enforcement & Legal"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - VincentFrazer
+  - VirginIslands
+  - AttorneyGeneral
+  - JeffreyEpstein
+  - SexOffenderRegistration
+  - GovernmentCapture
+alias:
+  - Vincent F. Frazer
+  - Vincent Franklin Frazer
+  - Attorney General Vincent Frazer
+summary: "Attorney General of the U.S. Virgin Islands from 2006 to 2015 who in 2012 cut Jeffrey Epstein's required notice of travel from 21 days to 24 hours at the request of Epstein's lawyers."
+location: "St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands"
+relations:
+  - type: head_of
+    with: "[[Virgin Islands Department of Justice]]"
+    start: 2006
+    end: 2015
+    role: "Attorney General"
+    fn: 1
+  - type: employed_by
+    with: "[[Virgin Islands Port Authority]]"
+    role: "senior counsel"
+    fn: 7
+created: 2026-09-25
+updated: 2026-09-25
+---
+
+Vincent F. Frazer is a [[U.S. Virgin Islands]] lawyer who was Attorney General of the territory from 2006 to 2015, through both terms of Governor [[John de Jongh]]. As head of the [[Virgin Islands Department of Justice]], which kept the territorial sex-offender registry, he received a 2009 request from [[Jeffrey Epstein|Jeffrey Epstein's]] lawyers to take over supervision of Epstein's [[Florida]] sentence, and in July and August 2012, after meeting Epstein's lawyers, he waived the 21-day advance notice of travel required by a newly passed sex-offender law and allowed Epstein to give 24 hours' notice by email. The arrangement stood until March 2019. He was later senior counsel at the [[Virgin Islands Port Authority]], and was named in a federal trafficking suit that was dismissed in 2025.[^1][^2][^3]
+
+### The 2009 Supervision Request
+
+In 2009, before the start of the year of community control that followed his Florida jail sentence, Epstein's counsel wrote to "The Honorable Vincent F. Frazer, Attorney General of the United States Virgin Islands," asking for help in transferring Epstein's supervision from Florida to the Virgin Islands. The letter described Epstein as "a full-time resident of the Virgin Islands, who maintains his home at [[Little St. James]]," and stated that "his place of employment was, and still is, [[Financial Trust Company|Financial Trust Company, Inc.]], located at Red Hook Quarter in [[St. Thomas]]." It acknowledged that Epstein "is required, at least under Florida law, to register as a sex offender," but argued that "as his state charge was a non-violent offense, i.e., procuring a minor for prostitution, Virgin Islands law would govern as to Mr. Epstein's registration requirements." It named the interstate compact coordinators for Florida and the Virgin Islands and Epstein's Florida probation officer, and gave July 22, 2009 as the start of his supervision.[^2]
+
+### The 2012 Travel Waivers
+
+In 2012 the [[Legislature of the Virgin Islands]] passed Bill 29-0239, enacted as Act No. 7372, which amended chapter 86 of title 14 of the Virgin Islands Code to expand the monitoring of sex offenders and set a 21-day advance notice requirement for travel, with discretion for the Attorney General to reduce it. The Rules and Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the bill on June 21, 2012. On July 13, 2012, before the governor signed it, Frazer met the St. Thomas attorney [[Maria Tankenson Hodge]] and Epstein's lawyer [[Darren Indyke]] to discuss its implementation. Hodge wrote to Frazer on July 16 asking that Epstein be allowed to continue his practice of notifying the department by email or fax "immediately prior to Mr. Epstein's departure," giving only "the general geographic areas of his travel," and that his existing practice be "deemed compliance with the new law" until Frazer ruled.[^3]
+
+On July 25, 2012 Frazer accepted the letter as a request "for the Attorney General to waive the 21 day prior notice requirement," and wrote: "Based upon your representation and that of Attorney Darren Indyke, we will grant the waiver of the (21) twenty one day notice requirement to the Department of Justice when Mr. Epstein is traveling out of the Territory." He set conditions, including 72 hours' notice and the addresses of temporary lodging, and added: "I do recognize that these conditions vary from the former conditions. However in light of the discretion given to the Attorney General by Act No.7372, we are forced to take a closer look at the waiver conditions."[^3]
+
+Hodge replied on July 30 that the 72-hour rule and the address requirement were "unduly restrictive," and wrote that "both you and Senator Russell stated during the hearing on the Act before the Rules and Judiciary Committee on June 21, 2012, that the travel notification requirements of this Act were specifically not intended to be penal in nature." On August 14, 2012 Frazer wrote that "in light of the justification set out in your letter of July 30, 2012, I have decided to shorten the notice period": Epstein would "be allowed to notify the Department of Justice of his intention to travel out of the Territory twenty four (24) hours prior to his departure," could continue to notify the department when staying at one of his "stateside homes," and when staying with "an associate" needed to give only the city and state or country. Frazer required copies of Epstein's driver's licenses, identification cards and passports, and closed: "I trust that the foregoing conditions will be workable for your client, in light of his frequent trips out of the Territory on business."[^3]
+
+### Revocation
+
+Acting Attorney General [[Carol Thomas-Jacobs]] revoked the arrangement by letter of March 14, 2019, after Epstein was detained and refused entry in the [[Dominican Republic]] in February 2019, and required 21 days' notice in person for travel outside the United States. On April 30, 2019 the firm of Epstein's territorial counsel, [[Erika Kellerhals]], asked the incoming Attorney General, [[Denise George]], to reinstate "the proven travel notification procedures," attaching the Frazer correspondence. George answered on June 2, 2019: "While my predecessors have apparently had differing interpretations of Title 14, Section 1724(b)(4) of the Virgin Islands Code, it is my understanding that the 21-day in-person notification for international travel can only be waived upon a showing of 'reasonable and reliable proof satisfactory to the Department of Justice'... In this particular case, I have not been presented with any documentation of such proof, nor does the VIDOJ have any record of such documentation ever having been submitted to the VIDOJ." She asked for "the documentation that was originally submitted to Attorney General Frazer that validated such a waiver."[^3]
+
+In an October 2, 2023 interview with the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]], released by the [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]] in January 2026, George said she "believed that Frazer was pressured by then Governor John De Jongh" to grant the waiver. De Jongh's wife, [[Cecile de Jongh]], was the office manager of Epstein's territorial companies throughout her husband's two terms. Frazer was deposed in the territory's suit against [[JPMorgan Chase]], and, like the other officials deposed, said he had no knowledge of Epstein's crimes.[^4][^5]
+
+### Litigation and Later Career
+
+On November 22, 2023 six women identified as Jane Does named Frazer, with the territorial government, the de Jonghs, Governor [[Kenneth Mapp]], [[Celestino White]], [[Carlton Dowe]] and [[Stacey Plaskett]], in a suit in the [[U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York]] alleging that the defendants made the territory a "safe haven" for Epstein's trafficking; the complaint alleged among other things that Epstein had been labeled a Tier 1 sex offender when he should have been Tier 2. On March 21, 2025 Judge [[Arun Subramanian]] dismissed the claims against Frazer and the other defendants except Plaskett for lack of personal jurisdiction in New York. The court's mailing receipt for its September 2025 dismissal order was addressed to "Attorney General Vincent Frazer" at a post office box on St. Thomas.[^1][^6]
+
+In October 2022 the Supreme Court of the Virgin Islands publicly reprimanded Frazer, then senior counsel at the Virgin Islands Port Authority, after a complaint that, while representing the seller of a business, he had unilaterally disbursed a disputed good-faith deposit held in escrow to his client and deducted his fees. He consented to the reprimand, the return of the funds to escrow and six additional hours of continuing legal education, on pain of a six-month suspension. The Port Authority's executive director, Carlton Dowe, was a co-defendant in the 2023 trafficking suit.[^1][^7][^8]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: Doe 1 v. Government of the United States Virgin Islands, No. 1:23-cv-10301-AS (S.D.N.Y.), Opinion and Order, ECF No. 202 (March 21, 2025), pp. 1 to 2, 7 to 8, 16 to 17 (Frazer as Attorney General from 2006 to 2015). https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.610915/gov.uscourts.nysd.610915.202.0.pdf
+[^2]: U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00727487, DataSet 9, letter from counsel for Jeffrey Epstein to Attorney General Vincent F. Frazer requesting transfer of Epstein's supervision from Florida to the Virgin Islands, 2009 (duplicate EFTA00727485). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00727487.pdf
+[^3]: Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.), Exhibit 83, ECF No. 194-24 (filed June 20, 2023), pp. 2 to 7 (Kellerhals Ferguson Kroblin letter to Denise George, April 30, 2019), 36 to 47 (Hodge letters of July 16 and July 30, 2012; Frazer letters of July 25 and August 14, 2012), 56 to 58 (George email of June 2, 2019). https://web.archive.org/web/20260117011719/https://www.justice.gov/multimedia/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank,%20N.A.,%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/194-24.pdf
+[^4]: Carlson, Suzanne. "Docs confirm Bryan pressed for special treatment of sex offender." *Virgin Islands Daily News,* February 2, 2026. https://www.virginislandsdailynews.com/news/docs-confirm-bryan-pressed-for-special-treatment-of-sex-offender/article_5e9483c9-38d2-406c-8bb0-e5757ce287f2.html (George's FBI interview; Frazer waiver; Cecile de Jongh's employment).
+[^5]: Carlson, Suzanne. "Files reveal Epstein's efforts to influence V.I. officials; emails with Mapp." *Virgin Islands Daily News,* February 2, 2026. https://www.virginislandsdailynews.com/news/files-reveal-epstein-s-efforts-to-influence-v-i-officials-emails-with-mapp/article_2dd4fe69-4daf-4dc2-b3b8-37a929002bb6.html
+[^6]: Doe 1 v. Government of the United States Virgin Islands, No. 1:23-cv-10301-AS (S.D.N.Y.), docket, including Stipulation and Order of Dismissal, ECF No. 224 (September 23, 2025), and mailing receipt to "Attorney General Vincent Frazer," St. Thomas (September 24, 2025). https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68031620/doe-1-v-government-of-the-united-states-virgin-islands/
+[^7]: "V.I. Supreme Court Reprimands Former Attorney General for Issuing Good Faith Deposit for Potential Sale of Business to Client While a Dispute Was Ongoing." *The Virgin Islands Consortium,* October 31, 2022. https://viconsortium.com/vi-government/virgin-islands-v-i-supreme-court-reprimands-former-attorney-general-for-issuing-good-faith-deposit-for-potential-sale-of-business-to-client-while-a-dispute-was-ongoing
+[^8]: "Former Gov. Kenneth Mapp Visited Epstein's Island, Sought $50,000 for Final Election Push, DOJ Records Show." *The Virgin Islands Consortium,* January 31, 2026 (Port Authority Executive Director Carlton Dowe). https://viconsortium.com/vi-federal/virgin-islands-former-gov--kenneth-mapp-visited-epstein-s-island--sought--50-000-for--final-push---doj-records-show

10 - PEOPLE/(A-G)/Virginia Giuffre.md

@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@ In the summer of 2000 Giuffre took a job as a locker-room attendant at the Mar-a
 
 ### Recruitment and Trafficking Allegations
 
-Giuffre said that Ghislaine Maxwell approached her while she was working at the Mar-a-Lago spa, reading a book on massage therapy, and recruited her ostensibly to train as a masseuse for Epstein, taking her that evening to Epstein's nearby Palm Beach house. She said she was then drawn into sexual abuse by Epstein and trafficked to other men over a period of years, traveling among Epstein's residences in New York, Palm Beach, [[New Mexico|New Mexico]], and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and abroad. She described Maxwell as central to Epstein's operation and said she was presented to Epstein's associates as available for sexual purposes.[^1][^2]
+Giuffre said that Ghislaine Maxwell approached her while she was working at the Mar-a-Lago spa, reading a book on massage therapy, and recruited her ostensibly to train as a masseuse for Epstein, taking her that evening to Epstein's nearby [[Palm Beach, Florida|Palm Beach]] house. She said she was then drawn into sexual abuse by Epstein and trafficked to other men over a period of years, traveling among Epstein's residences in New York, Palm Beach, [[New Mexico|New Mexico]], and the [[U.S. Virgin Islands]], and abroad. She described Maxwell as central to Epstein's operation and said she was presented to Epstein's associates as available for sexual purposes.[^1][^2]
 
 Among the men Giuffre said Epstein directed her to was Prince Andrew, whom she said she was made to have sex with on three occasions beginning in London in March 2001 when she was 17, around the time she was photographed with him at Maxwell's Belgravia home. Andrew has denied the allegations and settled her civil suit without admitting liability. Giuffre also named other men in her filings and interviews, including the financier [[Jean-Luc Brunel|Jean-Luc Brunel]] and the attorney [[Alan Dershowitz|Alan Dershowitz]]; those named denied her accounts. Her allegations against individuals other than Epstein and Maxwell were not adjudicated as criminal findings.[^1][^2]
 
@@ -112,7 +112,7 @@ Her memoir [[Nobody's Girl|Nobody's Girl]], co-written with the author [[Amy Wal
 
 Giuffre died without a valid will. In June 2025 two of her sons applied to the Supreme Court of Western Australia to be appointed administrators of the estate, which includes property in Western Australia, what remained of the settlement with Andrew (reported at 12 million pounds), and revenue from her memoir. Their application was opposed by her former carer, Cheryl Myers, and her former Perth lawyer, Karrie Louden, who sought appointment themselves; her estranged husband Robert Giuffre had agreed to the sons' writ, and the court registrar noted that he should be joined as a party.[^18]
 
-In late November 2025 the court appointed a Western Australian lawyer, Ian Torrington Blatchford, as interim administrator, at 400 Australian dollars an hour. The court's orders listed existing legal proceedings the administrator would conduct, among them the 2015 case against Maxwell and "an arbitration" involving Alan Dershowitz, three years after the 2022 settlement of their litigation. They also included a defamation suit for 10 million dollars filed in the Southern District of New York in October 2021 by [[Rina Oh]], who alleged that Giuffre had portrayed her "as an accomplice to Epstein rather than a victim"; an appeals court had ruled that Oh's claim survived Giuffre's death.[^18][^19]
+In late November 2025 the court appointed a Western Australian lawyer, Ian Torrington Blatchford, as interim administrator, at 400 Australian dollars an hour. The court's orders listed existing legal proceedings the administrator would conduct, among them the 2015 case against Maxwell and "an arbitration" involving Alan Dershowitz, three years after the 2022 settlement of their litigation. They also included a defamation suit for 10 million dollars filed in the [[U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York|Southern District of New York]] in October 2021 by [[Rina Oh]], who alleged that Giuffre had portrayed her "as an accomplice to Epstein rather than a victim"; an appeals court had ruled that Oh's claim survived Giuffre's death.[^18][^19]