Today, Explained - The ghost of Jeffrey Epstein

Episode Date: September 13, 2021

Jeffrey Epstein has been dead for over two years, but his crimes and mysterious death still haunt his victims and friends. The Miami Herald’s Julie K. Brown explains. Today’s show was produced by Haleema Shah, edited by Matt Collette, engineered by Paul Mounsey, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Support Today, Explained by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit Superstore.ca to get started. A heads up that today's show is about Jeffrey Epstein and his sex crimes. We will start in a second. Jeffrey Epstein has been dead for just over two years now, but he's still in the news. Most recently, it's because one of his most powerful friends, a lesser Prince of England,

might finally face charges for sexual assault. New legal trouble for Britain's Prince Andrew. Virginia Roberts, chief free, an outspoken accuser of the late convicted sex offender jeffrey epstein is now suing the son of queen elizabeth virginia jufri says epstein introduced her to prince andrew who sexually assaulted her multiple times when she was under 18 gielan woke me up in the morning and said, you're going to meet a prince today. I didn't know at that point that I was going to be trafficked to that prince. The allegations have been around for years,

but for the last few days, this particular royal's been on the run. Prince Andrew's Epstein troubles show no signs of going away anytime soon. But the prince himself has last seen 500 miles north at the Queen's estate in Scotland. Lawyers for his accuser say he's trying to evade the civil suit they filed against him. His security guards have apparently turned attempts away to serve those papers.

So he's scampered off to mummy's house. On the show today, we're going to try and explain how the ghost of Jeffrey Epstein continues to haunt his friends as well as his victims. And we're going to try and tackle some of the big unanswered questions surrounding his case. The biggest of all, of course, being what happened to Epstein himself. We reached out to the reporter who really changed the course of this case to get her take, Miami Herald reporter Julie K. Brown. She just wrote a book about Epstein, and in it, there's a chapter titled... Jeffrey Epstein didn't kill himself.

Which felt bold, so we had to know, which is maybe a little bit more than most people, that he was capable or even had wanted to really throw the towel in, so to speak, at this stage of the game. He was someone who always believed he was above the law and could use his power and influence to get away with almost anything. So it's, you know, for just those simple reasons at the outset, the fact that the medical examiner in New York ruled his death a suicide is deserving of more scrutiny, let's put it that way. Well, let's take it back to when Jeffrey Epstein lands himself in a Manhattan jail. Remind us what he's arrested for. Well, of course, he was arrested on a new indictment out of New

York on several sex trafficking charges involving minors. These charges went back many, many years. However, you know, the sex trafficking statute doesn't have a limitation on it, at least not right now. But it was certain that his lawyers would probably challenge the dated nature of some of these sex acts that he was charged with. In any event, he was arrested and there was a bail hearing. He was not given bail. And at the time that he died, he was hiring lawyers left and right for not only his criminal case to fight the charges, but also to come up with another way for him to get bail. So when Jeffrey Epstein ends up in the Metropolitan Correctional Center, which

you refer to as a notoriously inhumane gulag in your book. How do he and his team try to fight his case? Well, they mounted quite an effort to get him bail. His bail package was almost fit for someone who was more like a king because he wanted to be released back into his mansion in Manhattan, which is one of the largest private residents in the city, and to hire his own security force and to be monitored with some kind of ankle equipment. And he was willing to pay a huge amount of bail in order to spend his days waiting trial in his own mansion. But of course,

part of the scandal involving Epstein to begin with was that when he was originally arrested in Florida, he was put in a local jail and he essentially got white glove treatment in that he also was allowed to leave and spend time in his lavish office in West Palm Beach up to 16 hours a day. And he just basically slept in that jail and was out during the day. So it was probably going to be very unlikely that authorities were going to release him in any fashion, given the fact that the charges also were pretty strong charges and he had the means to flee. Almost as soon as he gets to this Metropolitan Correctional Center, there's this report of attempted suicide. Is that right?

Right. But it was sort of murky. They never confirmed that it was. I think it was, they have some, first of all, the really bizarre thing was they housed him with this giant, beefy former cop who was accused of a quadruple murder. Now, why would you house, you know, Jeffrey Epstein was not a big man. He was very, you know, slender and 60-something years old. And so why would you house someone like that, especially since he was accused, basically an accused child molester, with a big, giant former cop who's accused of killing four people? It just doesn't make any sense to begin with. So the only reason why I think we heard that he tried to do something to himself was because the cop's lawyer claimed that he had tried to commit suicide.

But we don't really know for sure what happened in this first incident in which they put him into some kind of seclusion or suicide watch because nobody has ever really mentioned exactly the circumstances that led him to be in that secluded suicide watch area. And around this time of the first supposed attempted suicide, whatever abuse Jeffrey Epstein may have encountered, he is meeting with his lawyers constantly. Is that right? Yeah, that was what he did when he was charged here in Florida. Even when he finally did go to the jail, it was almost like he couldn't be alone. He would essentially hire people, even if they were, you know, legal paralegals, to just sit with him, you know, in the visiting area of the jail. And therefore, he was able to say, well, I'm preparing my case, and he didn't have to go back to the cell block and be with, you know, there were a lot of inmates we later heard that had been threatening him, trying to extort him, because,

of course, child molesters, accused child molesters, are on the lowest rung of the prison hierarchy. And there were probably a lot of inmates that were, you know, gunning for him, so to speak. And he felt safer in, you know, a room where he had lawyers and others there with him. And so that's what he did when he was in Florida as well. He had round-the-clock lawyers visiting him. Before we talk about some of the theories about how he may have died, let's talk about the story coming from the authorities, the stories coming from the Metropolitan Correctional Center. What do they say transpired. We do know that there were two correctional officers on duty at the time and that they either fell asleep part of the time and or were on their computers not paying attention. In any event, there was this time period where he no one was really checking on him

because he had just gotten off a suicide watch. They were supposed to check on him every 30 minutes. The records that we know about show that they stopped around 3.30 a.m. and they allegedly fell asleep. These were two staff members who had been working overtime, and then they falsified records to make it look like they had checked in on him when they didn't. All we know is that the guards allege that when they did check on him, they found him hanging from a sheet that was tied to the top bunk of his cell. And of course there was eventually an autopsy. What does it reveal? Well, the official autopsy simply just said he died of suicide by hanging. We don't know anything other than that.

However, his family hired a noted forensic pathologist, Dr. Michael Bodden, who was present at the autopsy, and he revealed later that Epstein had three broken bones in his neck. There were multiple fractures of the Adam's apple, the thyroid cartilage, and the thyroid, and the hyoid bone that are more indicative of a homicidal strangulation than a suicidal strangulation. And according to Bodden and other experts that I've spoken with, it would have been very difficult, if not almost impossible, for him to do something like that by jumping or pushing his body weight against the top cell of his body.

There was not enough velocity for him to do that much damage to his neck at the time, according to Bodden. There were other irregularities, for example, that didn't make sense. He had a sleep apnea machine on the floor of his cell that had all kinds of wires attached to it. I mean, why would you have something like that in a cell of someone who had been on suicide watch? His cellmate who had been with him until the day before was mysteriously transferred to another prison. So Epstein was alone. You know, you have to ask, well, why would they leave a guy who they just took out a suicide watch alone, not check him and then leave him in a cell with wires?

There is just too many strange things that happened in the hours before they found his body. And how does that sit with Epstein's victims? None of them believe that he killed himself. I mean, one of the victims I couldn't reach, but I got her mother. And her mother, as soon as her mother got on the phone, she said, oh, my God, they killed him. There are very few people, I think, that believe he killed himself. And of course, the reason people want to fill these holes is because at the end of the day, it's pretty easy to believe that a lot of powerful people may have wanted Jeffrey Epstein dead. I think that it's very possible. I mean, the way that Jeffrey Epstein conducted himself,

he had a whole ecosystem of people around him who either knew what he was doing, participated in sex trafficking, or at the very least were complicit and looked the other way. And we're seeing the fallout now from even people like Bill Gates, who were friendly with him, not even really close friends with him, just friendly with him, and how much that has harmed his reputation. And there are countless other people who were involved with him whose reputations have been really tarnished just by being associated with him.

More with Julie in a minute on Today Explained. Support for Today Explained comes from Ramp. Thank you. give finance teams unprecedented control and insight into company spend. With Ramp, you're able to issue cards to every employee with limits and restrictions and automate expense reporting so you can stop wasting time at the end of every month. And now you can get $250 when you join Ramp. You can go to ramp.com slash explained, ramp.com slash explained, R-A-M-P.com slash explained. Cards issued by Sutton Bank, member FDIC, terms and conditions apply. And no matter your team, your favorite player, or your style, there's something every NBA fan will love about BetMGM. Download the app today and discover why BetMGM is your basketball home for the season. Raise your game to the next level this year with BetMGM, a sportsbook worth a slam dunk and authorized gaming partner of the NBA. BetMGM.com for terms and conditions.

Must be 19 years of age or older to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Julie, who was Jeffrey Epstein to the very many powerful, wealthy men in his social circle? Well, I think he was a source of funding for a lot of people for causes that they had or research they wanted to do. I mean, he was a source of money. I think in some ways he was also very charismatic. You know,

he fancied himself as a scientist and intellectual and just someone who was on the same level as some of the brightest and wealthiest people in the world. And he felt that he was, you know, the same way. And so he surrounded himself with those people. And how did his affiliations with extremely wealthy, smart, powerful American and even foreign men help him evade accountability in life? Well, I think it wasn't a question of they helped him evade it. I think that they helped burnish his reputation and his standing in a lot of different places. I mean, for one thing, I think he used his associations with them

to help trap other women into his orbit. You know, they would see that he is, you know, photographs of him with some of the most famous people in the world. And these women, I think, and girls felt that he was so important. And that combined with the promises that he made to help their careers or help them with their education sort of trapped them into this cycle of sexual violence and abuse. And obviously we talked about Prince Andrew at the top of the show, but I'm wondering if you could tell me how this ghost of Jeffrey Epstein has haunted other powerful people he associated with. Well, we know that Les Wexner is the founder of L Brands

and also owned Victoria's Secret. He was forced to step down. A New York Times article says Wexner was warned by other L Brands executives in the mid-90s that Epstein was presenting himself to women as a recruiter of Victoria's Secret models. Of course, he claims he knew nothing about what Jeffrey Epstein was doing. And he himself claims that Epstein stole money from him, although he never reported it to

authorities or seemed to see fit to find a way to recoup it. Everyone has to feel enormous regret for the advantage that was taken of so many young women. And that's just unexplainable, abhorrent behavior. You have Leon Black, you know, with Apollo Capital. His company launched an investigation into why Mr. Black would have invested so much money in someone or put his own money in Jeffrey Epstein's hands, given the fact that he was suspected of being a sex trafficker and a pedophile. Apollo Global Management CEO Leon Black paid sex predator Jeffrey Epstein $158 million

for financial advice, but an outside law firm says that Black wasn't involved with Epstein's criminal activities. And now, you know, we have Bill Gates, whose wife reportedly cautioned and warned Mr. Gates about being involved with Epstein. She knew at the outset that there was something really wrong about him. And we just heard recently that Mr. Gates has apologized and said it was a big mistake for him to associate with Epstein. You know, I made a mistake in judgment that I thought that those discussions would lead literally to billions of dollars going to global health. Turned out that was a bad judgment. That was a mirage. None of that money ever appeared. And I gave him some benefit by the association.

So I made a doubly wrong mistake there. Prince Andrew, he was friends with Epstein, but he denies that he participated or knew anything about Epstein's crimes. However, the difference with him and some of the other people is we have a photograph of him with one of Epstein's victims with his arm around her waist. Prince Andrew has repeatedly denied the allegations, telling the BBC in 2019. I have no recollection of ever meeting this lady.

In the same interview, he also suggested this photo at Ghislaine Maxwell's house in London was doctored, saying. And I do not remember anything. There was another witness that saw him with Virginia Dufresne, who was one of Epstein's victims. So he's having a hard time denying that he did anything with this young woman who we have a photograph of with. So it'll be interesting to see because he's, you know, part of the royal family. He has somewhat been ostracized by a lot of members of his family and the public, I think, in Britain. And Galen Maxwell, who is now awaiting trial in New York on charges of sex

trafficking and being basically accused of helping Epstein execute this sex trafficking operation. Maxwell enticed minor girls, got them to trust her, then delivered them into the trap that she and Epstein had set for them. She pretended to be a woman they could trust. All the while, she was setting them up to be sexually abused by Epstein and in some cases by Maxwell herself. Of course, she denies it. She's taking a page out of the Epstein defense playbook in that she's hiring the best defense that her money can buy. And these lawyers are very aggressive and they're peppering and giving these prosecutors a lot of legal motions to respond to, you know, which was one of the things Epstein did the first

time around where he would just give, he would just basically bury prosecutors in tons of motions to the point that the prosecutors didn't even want to deal with his lawyers anymore. So she's doing a similar tactic. And her family has also launched a PR campaign by going online and on social media to plead the fact that she should be considered innocent until proven guilty. I know you spent a lot of time with Jeffrey Epstein's victims, Julie. Do they feel cheated out of justice thus far? I think they do. I think that they're still very angry and are skeptical that prosecutors are going to continue this investigation beyond Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. They believe that there were a lot of other people that were involved

and particularly men who were engaged in sex with minors. And they believe that authorities should go after everyone who helped Epstein. And, you know, I think that there is some concern that authorities are going to charge and, you know, possibly convict Ghislaine Maxwell and then not go any further with the case. So there are some victims out there that are pressuring prosecutors to continue their investigations so that other people are held accountable. What hurts even more so is that if I wasn't afraid to come forward sooner, then maybe he wouldn't have done it to other girls. I feel really guilty. To this day, I feel really guilty. For the past 16 years, I have felt isolated in my experience.

And the lack of consequences for Epstein's actions has left me feeling as though there is no justice for me here. They failed us before. Don't fail us again. Exactly. That's all we're asking. Even though maybe I don't look it because I'm so sad, but also happy tears because I'm able to, you know,

let myself go of this burden. I feel brave, I feel strong more than ever right now. My hope is that this case and the resulting public discourse will help me to take back some of the power and self-esteem I lost as a victim of Jeffrey Epstein's crimes. Jeffrey thought that we were disposable and he threw us all away. And look who's still standing. Julie K. Brown is an investigative journalist with the Miami Herald.

Her book on Jeffrey Epstein's sex crimes is called Perversion of Justice, The Jeffrey Epstein Story. Our episode today was produced by Halima Shah. I'm Sean Ramos for him. It's Today Explained. you