A US federal judge has given the Justice Department permission to release transcripts of a grand jury investigation into Jeffrey Epstein's abuse of underage girls in Florida — a case that ultimately ended without any federal charges being filed against the millionaire sex offender.
US District Judge Rodney Smith said a recently passed federal law ordering the release of records related to Epstein overrode the usual rules about grand jury secrecy.
The law signed in November by President Donald Trump compels the Justice Department, FBI and federal prosecutors to release later this month the vast troves of material they have amassed during investigations into Epstein that date back at least two decades.
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Friday's court ruling dealt with the earliest known federal inquiry.
In 2005, police in Palm Beach, Florida, where Epstein had a mansion, began interviewing teenage girls who told of being hired to give the financier sexualised massages. The FBI later joined the investigation.
Federal prosecutors in Florida prepared an indictment in 2007, but Epstein's lawyers attacked the credibility of his accusers publicly while secretly negotiating a plea bargain that would let him avoid serious jail time.
In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to relatively minor state charges of soliciting prostitution from someone under age eighteen. He served most of his eighteen-month sentence in a work release programme that let him spend his days in his office.
The US attorney in Miami at the time, Alex Acosta, agreed not to prosecute Epstein on federal charges — a decision that outraged Epstein's accusers. After the Miami Herald reexamined the unusual plea bargain in a series of stories in 2018, public outrage over Epstein's light sentence led to Acosta's resignation as Trump's labour secretary.
A Justice Department report in 2020 found that Acosta exercised "poor judgement" in handling the investigation, but it also said he did not engage in professional misconduct.
A different federal prosecutor, in New York, brought a sex trafficking indictment against Epstein in 2019, mirroring some of the same allegations involving underage girls that had been the subject of the aborted investigation. Epstein killed himself while awaiting trial. His longtime confidant and ex-girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, was then tried on similar charges, convicted and sentenced in 2022 to twenty years in prison.
Transcripts of the grand jury proceedings from the aborted federal case in Florida could shed more light on federal prosecutors' decision not to go forward with it. Records related to state grand jury proceedings have already been made public.
When the documents will be released is unknown. The Justice Department asked the court to unseal them so they could be released with other records required to be disclosed under the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The Justice Department hasn't set a timetable for when it plans to start releasing information, but the law set a deadline of December 19.
The law also allows the Justice Department to withhold files that it says could jeopardise an active federal investigation. Files can also be withheld if they're found to be classified or if they pertain to national defence or foreign policy.
One of the federal prosecutors on the Florida case did not answer a phone call on Friday and the other declined to answer questions.
A judge had previously declined to release the grand jury records, citing the usual rules about grand jury secrecy, but Smith said the new federal law allowed public disclosure.
The Justice Department has separate requests pending for the release of grand jury records related to the sex trafficking cases against Epstein and Maxwell in New York. The judges in those matters have said they plan to rule expeditiously.
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Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).
For under 25s: Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800.
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