When Jeffrey Epstein bought Little Saint James, the teardrop-shaped island south‑east of St. Thomas, within the late Nineteen Nineties, he was seen as a mere oddity. A one-time math instructor who claimed to handle the fortunes of billionaires, he advised U.S. Virgin Islands officers that he was searching for privateness. He additionally seems to have bought impunity.
The alleged crimes that Epstein dedicated on that emerald island reachable solely by helicopter or ferry would explode into a world scandal. Investigators accuse him of raping and sexually abusing ladies as younger as eleven at his island compound the place he additionally hosted many A-list politicians, enterprise leaders and celebrities. One 15-year-old, whom Epstein allegedly compelled into intercourse acts, tried to flee by swimming away from the island. She was caught and her passport was taken away.
Whereas Epstein was alive, Virgin Islands officers seem to have shielded him from scrutiny – customs brokers on the airport, for instance, reported seeing Epstein depart his airplane with ladies between the ages of 11 and 17, but there isn’t a report that anybody checked on their security.
After his demise in 2019, different officers who aided Epstein started making the most of continued secrecy and a string of authorized settlements related along with his conduct that put a whole lot of tens of millions of {dollars} beneath the federal government’s management. Nobody seems to have benefited greater than Albert Bryan Jr., the governor of the territory. Courtroom information present that Bryan had beforehand overseen the company that granted practically $300 million in illicit tax credit to Epstein’s firm, which fraudulently claimed to present “biomedical and monetary informatics” companies. Bryan, after securing a gubernatorial victory in 2018 with the assist of Epstein and his aides, would later push for a waiver for Epstein to keep away from compliance with the island’s intercourse offender legal guidelines.
Using Epstein settlement funds by Virgin Islands Gov. Albert Bryan (proper) has raised questions.
AP
Bryan fired the legal professional normal who led the island’s circumstances towards Epstein’s property, and his appointed successor ended an explosive case over J.P. Morgan Chase’s ties to the previous financier earlier than a brand new spherical of discovery.
Over the previous few months, legislative information present, Bryan has tapped the Epstein settlement funds to pay for a wide range of his home political agenda gadgets. The cash was secured from Epstein’s property and his associates, together with the case with J.P. Morgan Chase and a detailed monetary supporter, personal billionaire Leon Black, who was additionally accused of abusing ladies. The settlements, which collectively account for practically 1 / 4 of a billion {dollars}, had been championed as a measure of accountability, and the proceeds had been promised to help victims of sexual assault, human trafficking, sexual misconduct, and baby sexual abuse.
In late April, Bryan, at his weekly briefing on the Authorities Home on St. Thomas, introduced the allocation of $22 million in retroactive wages to authorities staff, a transfer his workplace touted as strengthening public belief. “That is actual cash – cash within the financial institution,” Bryan boasted. Left unmentioned was the supply – the Epstein settlement cash.
Earlier this 12 months, Bryan utilized the Epstein funds for vendor funds and sought to make use of the cash for a wide range of different earmarks, resembling a $25 million makeover for the Justice Constructing on St. Croix. The shortage of transparency across the funds has confronted scrutiny from legislators and a few Virgin Islands residents.
The whole quantity remaining within the Epstein settlement fund just isn’t clear. Motley Rice, a personal legislation agency that assisted the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI) Justice Division with the circumstances, is projected to obtain about $23.35 million of the settlement as its share of the charges.
“We’ve got a state of affairs the place among the monies might need been spent, regardless that they had been appropriated for particular functions,” stated USVI Senator Alma Francis Heyliger. “The legislature didn’t give approval for this.”
In a letter posted on-line final 12 months, David Silverman, a retiree dwelling in St. John, acknowledged, “This cash was promised for use to guard susceptible younger ladies, amongst different issues. However for causes that no one can clarify, the cash is nowhere to be discovered.”
The U.S. Division of Justice maintains oversight of the USVI, a jurisdiction that has been stricken by corruption. In recent times, FBI brokers have raided territory businesses over the mismanagement of public cash. In June 2024, a number of senior USVI officers had been charged with defrauding $4 million in housing funds. The FBI declined to touch upon whether or not it’s investigating the USVI’s use of Epstein settlement funds.
The Bryan administration didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Legal professional Basic Pam Bondi promised an early and full launch of the Epstein information however has to this point didn’t ship.
AP
Questions proceed to swirl over the Epstein secrets and techniques nonetheless buried in authorities vaults. The much-hyped Trump administration launch of information associated to the Epstein case rapidly turned to disappointment in February as the federal government distributed binders with no new info. Legal professional Basic Pam Bondi, in response to criticism of the fizzled press occasion, has stated she continues to be pushing for the discharge of extra information held by the FBI and her division.
Whereas consideration nonetheless focuses on the 256,000 square-foot warehouse in Winchester, Virginia, the place unreleased FBI information, together with CDs, exhausting drives, and recordings from Epstein’s properties, are nonetheless held, the Virgin Islands facet of the story stays unresolved. The tropical territory stays one of many final redoubts of intrigue associated to the scandal.
The island territory was the nexus for Epstein’s alleged human trafficking operation. It was there that Epstein entertained his VIP rolodex of friends and is believed to have engaged in a few of his worst sexual crimes.
The abrupt settlement with J.P. Morgan Chase prevented the discharge of extra disclosures in regards to the nature of Epstein’s community, together with paperwork and depositions from key figures who aided and abetted the previous financier.
The U.S. Virgin Islands authorities and JPMorgan Chase each denied claims of complicity in Epstein’s abuses. In a earlier assertion to reporters, the financial institution claimed it “would by no means have continued to do enterprise with him if we believed he was utilizing our financial institution in any approach to assist commit heinous crimes.”
Almost two years in the past, Bryan shut off the valve of a smattering of unflattering paperwork launched as a part of the island territory’s lawsuit with J.P. Morgan. After initially searching for $190 million from the financial institution for its function in aiding Epstein’s operations, Bryan shocked observers by firing his personal legal professional normal and reportedly pushed to finish the lawsuit.
The preliminary 2022 lawsuit charged that J.P. Morgan had “turned a blind eye” to clear proof that Epstein had used the financial institution to facilitate his intercourse trafficking operations. USVI claimed in court docket that it had uncovered proof that J.P. Morgan officers had repeatedly raised purple flags about Epstein, who maintained round 55 accounts and routinely referred his community to the financial institution’s wealth administration companies. In the meantime, J.P. Morgan executives joked over electronic mail about his curiosity in younger ladies.
However the financial institution hit again with a countersuit and filed a whole lot of paperwork, displays, and emails alleging “a decades-long quid professional quo between Epstein and the USVI authorities.” The authorized probe revealed the previous financier’s intensive system of alleged bribes and affect funds to USVI officers – cash, J.P. Morgan’s attorneys claimed, that “created a haven for Epstein’s felony exercise.”
Jeffrey Epstein used presents to curry favor with the previous first woman of the USVI, Cecile de Jongh.
AP
These information present that Epstein positioned the previous first woman of the island, Cecile de Jongh, on his payroll. She advised marketing campaign donations and focused presents to universities, civic teams, and the households of highly effective politicians. The presents seem to have helped Epstein win particular advantages, together with visas to convey younger ladies to the island and $300 million in illicit tax exemptions for his fraudulently registered info expertise firm.
J.P. Morgan’s legal professional filed paperwork with the court docket charging that de Jongh advised Epstein pay month-to-month retainers to native politicians, together with former USVI Senator Celestino White, to achieve “loyalty and entry.” The information confirmed he additionally gave free Thanksgiving turkeys to 78 federal customs brokers on the St. Thomas airport after coping with one “tough” officer.
The ties prolonged to the governor and the territory’s consultant in Congress, the incumbent lawmaker Stacey Plaskett. In his earlier function as head of the financial improvement workplace, Bryan signed off on a string of tax exemptions for Epstein’s Southern Belief enterprise entity. On the time, Plaskett served as counsel to the tax workplace.
Plaskett went on to work at Kellerhals Ferguson Kroblin PLLC, a USVI legislation agency Epstein retained for tax and authorized points. In 2014, as Plaskett geared as much as run for Congress, de Jongh suggested Epstein to assist her bid towards a well-liked native politician, Shawn-Michael Malone. “Shawn is the one who got here after you within the senate listening to final week. He’s nasty and must be defeated and now we have a pal in Stacey,” de Jongh wrote in an electronic mail uncovered by J.P. Morgan’s attorneys.
In the course of the election, Epstein’s closest aides and advisers, together with Darren Indyke, Lesley Groff, and Erica Kellerhals, donated to Plaskett, serving to her defeat Malone by simply 737 votes in what native press known as “one of many largest upsets in Virgin Island politics.” De Jongh wrote to Epstein to substantiate {that a} $13,000 company donation deliberate for the Democratic Social gathering can be made “for the good thing about Stacey Plaskett.”
Epstein repeatedly donated to Plaskett’s marketing campaign committees till his suicide in a New York Metropolis jail cell in 2019. In an electronic mail made public by the litigation, Plaskett wrote to Kellerhals and Lesley Groff, one other Epstein aide who reportedly helped him recruit younger ladies, to request the financier’s fundraising help. She additionally met with him at his New York Metropolis residence in a bid to request bigger donations to the DCCC, the Home Democrats’ marketing campaign arm.
Stacey Plaskett, who represents the USVI in Congress, labored for Epstein’s legislation agency and obtained marketing campaign donations from him.
Senate Tv
Plaskett didn’t reply to a request for remark. In March, a federal choose in New York dominated that Plaskett will proceed to function the only defendant in a case introduced by a number of victims of Epstein. The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act case fees that USVI officers conspired with Epstein to maintain his sex-trafficking scheme.
The case depends on a lot of the proof that the J.P. Morgan countersuit uncovered practically two years in the past.
The Epstein community additionally helped to elect Bryan governor. Kellerhals, marketing campaign finance disclosures solely obtained by RealClearInvestigations present, donated $1,000. Information from the J.P. Morgan litigation present additional proof of assist, together with an electronic mail from de Jongh suggesting $25,000 to an inauguration get together in Bryan’s honor and a reminder that Bryan had requested $30,000 in assist for the USVI Little League.
Bryan, as governor, requested that the USVI Justice Division present Epstein with a waiver for the territory’s intercourse offender registry. Epstein’s authorized requests for particular exemptions to the legislation, notably, had been facilitated by Kellerhals.
“Not each sexual offender or any individual, you understand, are within the place to have the governor make the request to the legal professional normal … that by itself indicated to me that (Epstein) was flexing his political affect over or with the governor,” Denise George, a former USVI legal professional normal stated in a deposition she gave as a part of the JPMorgan lawsuit.
Bryan, in a deposition with J.P. Morgan’s attorneys, dismissed issues about Epstein’s operations within the USVI. He stated he was solely conscious that “he copped a plea to having intercourse with a hooker who was beneath age,” a reference to Epstein’s 2008 conviction over baby prostitution.
On New 12 months’s Eve 2022, Bryan unexpectedly fired Denise George, the legal professional normal accountable for the J.P. Morgan lawsuit and the island’s landmark case towards the Epstein property. George had beforehand opposed Bryan’s requests for a waiver for Epstein to get across the island’s intercourse offender legal guidelines.
Former USVI Legal professional Basic Denise George was fired after clashing with Gov. Albert Bryan over Epstein’s intercourse offender classification waiver.
Wikipedia
Because the litigation continued to mount, J.P. Morgan’s attorneys threatened extra discovery and depositions of USVI officers. In a submitting to the court docket in September 2023, they argued that they deliberate higher investigations of a bunch of USVI’s elite, together with Bryan and Plaskett.
Just a few weeks after the submitting, USVI introduced its settlement, agreeing to finish its case in trade for $75 million, an quantity far beneath the preliminary quantity sought by the lawsuit.
The sudden finish to the case closed the uncommon window of disclosure into Epstein’s personal energy construction and the methods wherein he carried out his political operation.
Some lawmakers and island residents imagine secrets and techniques from the Epstein scandal are nonetheless hidden. The J.P. Morgan case proved too dangerous for the USVI elite because it uncovered embarrassing paperwork on all sides.
“Hear, as a neighborhood, I might moderately these items come out so we are able to clear up our neighborhood as a substitute of sticking our heads within the sand,” stated Senator Francis Heyliger. “The extra we clear up this territory, and extra issues are uncovered, I believe in the long term, it is going to be higher for us and as a neighborhood and for the individuals.”
The senator was clear that President Trump ought to launch new, unredacted Epstein information or strain USVI officers to offer extra readability over the financier’s affect. “If this administration, on a nationwide stage, chooses to place out extra info, I’m by no means one which believes it’s best to conceal from the reality.” she stated.
