A CBS News investigation found multiple “new discrepancies” — beyond the missing minute — in surveillance videos the FBI released in early July of Jeffery Epstein’s jail cell, the news station reported. The story drives a wrench into the federal government’s handling of the sex offender’s death and personal files that possibly implicated a number of high-profile politicians and celebrities.
According to CBS News, the 11-hour video doesn’t refute a ruling that Epstein died by suicide, but that the federal government’s claims following the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s report were unsubstantiated and inconsistent with the released footage.
News station’s findings
CBS News redrew the jail cell where Epstein stayed with diagrams and descriptions from a 2023 report the Justice Department Inspector General released on Epstein. The network found Epstein was seen alive on the video once at 7:49 p.m. on Aug. 9, 2019. Nearly 11 hours later, correctional officers at the Metropolitan Correctional Center rushed across the frame, finding Epstein’s dead body.
The FBI claimed that anyone who entered or attempted to enter the area where Epstein’s cell was located would have been seen on surveillance video. However, the news station said there’s no way to see if Epstein entered his cell or left the Special Housing Unit, or SHU, because views are either obstructed or wholly off camera. The FBI’s claim relied on the word of staff members Tova Noel and Michael Thomas that no one entered the area, according to CBS News.
A person seen in the video wearing an orange-color jumpsuit was also under review. The Justice Department’s report said in part that reviews of the footage, witness statements and Bureau of Prison records determined that a corrections officer was carrying linen or inmate clothing up to Epstein’s tier.
According to CBS News, video forensic experts said they were skeptical about that conclusion and “suggested that the shape could be a person dressed in an orange prison jumpsuit climbing the stairs.”
Other claims the news station contested were if the footage was raw due to the presence of a mouse cursor, a lost minute — possibly three — of recording, an unidentified person seen in the video, Noel escorting Epstein between a shower area and his cell and if someone could have inconspicuously entered the SHU or Epstein’s cell.
The assessment of Epstein’s death comes under more scrutiny as CBS News noted footage from other camera angles wasn’t in the report, despite a screenshot of elevators being disclosed. Mark Epstein, Epstein’s younger brother, told the news station that his brother was murdered. He added that not having footage of the actual tier where Epstein was held made it difficult to know if the door to his brother’s cell was properly locked or if other prisoners could access it.
The review published as the Justice Department petitions the U.S. District Court in New York’s southern district to release grand jury transcripts from Epstein’s 2019 indictment and a different jury charging Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s ex-girlfriend, in 2020. Maxwell is serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking.
DOJ seeks to make transcripts public
Attorney General Pam Bondi and other federal prosecutors filed a motion in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on July 18 to unseal grand jury transcripts relating to Epstein’s and Maxwell’s trials, according to court records. Those transcripts are sought for the grand jury’s 2019 indictment of Epstein and a 2020 indictment of Maxwell.
Bondi submitted a memorandum Tuesday, at the direction of Judge Richard Berman, who oversaw Epstein’s case, which stated public interest in the two cases and how the Justice Department and FBI investigated the two for possible sex crimes. Judge Paul Englemayer additionally mandated victims mentioned in the transcripts and Maxwell to respond to prosecutors’ motions by Aug. 5.
“The instant motions for unsealing are consistent with the fundamental purposes set forth in that memorandum given the magnitude and abhorrence of Epstein’s crimes: to provide information to the public while remaining sensitive to protecting the rights of victims,” the prosecutors wrote.
They added that the Justice Department contacted all but one victim who is mentioned in the transcripts. Maxwell is expected to file a response to the prosecutor’s motion, lawyers wrote.
The filings came amid scrutiny the Trump Administration is facing regarding the case after the Department of Justice announced it won’t release information relating to the case.
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Author: Alex Delia
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