Newly obtained data make clear Jeffrey Epstein’s jail suicide, frantic aftermath

NEW YORK — Two weeks earlier than ending his life, Jeffrey Epstein sat within the nook of his Manhattan jail cell together with his palms over his ears, determined to muffle the sound of a bathroom that wouldn’t cease working.

Epstein was agitated and unable to sleep, jail officers noticed in data newly obtained by The Associated Press. He referred to as himself a “coward” and complained he was struggling to adapt to life behind bars following his July 2019 arrest on federal intercourse trafficking and conspiracy fees – his lifetime of luxurious diminished to a concrete and metal cage.

The disgraced financier was below psychological commentary on the time for a suicide try simply days earlier that left his neck bruised and scraped. Yet, even after a 31-hour stint on suicide watch, Epstein insisted he wasn’t suicidal, telling a jail psychologist he had a “wonderful life” and “would be crazy” to finish it.

On Aug. 10, 2019, Epstein was lifeless.

Nearly 4 years later, the AP has obtained greater than 4,000 pages of paperwork associated to Epstein’s dying from the federal Bureau of Prisons below the Freedom of Information Act. They embrace an in depth psychological reconstruction of the occasions resulting in Epstein‘s suicide, in addition to his well being historical past, inner company stories, emails and memos and different data.

Taken collectively, the paperwork the AP obtained Thursday present probably the most full accounting thus far of Epstein‘s detention and dying, and its chaotic aftermath. The data assist to dispel the numerous conspiracy theories surrounding Epstein‘s suicide, underscoring how elementary failings on the Bureau of Prisons – together with extreme staffing shortages and staff slicing corners – contributed to Epstein‘s dying.

They shed new gentle on the federal jail company’s muddled response after Epstein was discovered unresponsive in his cell on the now-shuttered Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City.

In one electronic mail, a prosecutor concerned in Epstein‘s prison case complained a couple of ignorance from the Bureau of Prisons within the crucial hours after his dying, writing that it was “frankly unbelievable” that the company was issuing public press releases “before telling us basic information so that we can relay it to his attorneys who can relay it to his family.”

In one other electronic mail, a high-ranking Bureau of Prisons official made a spurious suggestion to the company’s director that information reporters should have been paying jail staff for details about Epstein’s dying as a result of they had been reporting particulars of the company’s failings – impugning the ethics of journalists and the company’s personal staff.

The paperwork additionally present a contemporary window into Epstein‘s conduct throughout his 36 days in jail, together with his beforehand unreported try to attach by mail with one other high-profile pedophile: Larry Nassar, the U.S. gymnastics workforce physician convicted of sexually abusing scores of athletes.

Epstein‘s letter to Nassar was found returned to sender in the jail’s mail room weeks after Epstein’s dying. “It appeared he mailed it out and it was returned back to him,” the investigator who discovered the letter wrote informed a jail official by electronic mail. “I am not sure if I should open it or should we hand it over to anyone?”

The letter itself was not included among the many paperwork turned over to the AP.

The night time earlier than Epstein’s dying, he excused himself from a gathering together with his attorneys to make a phone name to his household. According to a memo from a unit supervisor, Epstein informed a jail worker that he was calling his mom, who’d been lifeless for 15 years at that time.

Epstein‘s death put increased scrutiny on the Bureau of Prisons and spurred an AP investigation that has uncovered deep, previously unreported problems within the agency, the Justice Department’s largest with greater than 30,000 staff, 158,000 inmates and an annual price range of about $8 billion.

AP reporting has revealed rampant sexual abuse and different prison conduct by workers, in addition to dozens of escapes, prisoner deaths and extreme staffing shortages which have hampered responses to emergencies.

An inner memo, undated however despatched after Epstein’s dying, attributed issues on the now-shuttered jail to “seriously reduced staffing levels, improper or lack of training, and follow up and oversight.” The memo additionally detailed steps the Bureau of Prisons has taken to treatment lapses Epstein’s suicide uncovered, together with requiring supervisors to assessment surveillance video to make sure officers made required cell checks.

The staff tasked with guarding Epstein the night time he killed himself, Tova Noel and Michael Thomas, had been charged with mendacity on jail file s to make it appear as if they’d made their required checks earlier than Epstein was present in his cell.

Prosecutors alleged they had been sitting at their desks simply 15 toes (4.6 meters) from Epstein’s cell, shopped on-line for furnishings and bikes, and walked across the unit’s widespread space as a substitute of constructing required rounds each half-hour.

During one two-hour interval, each appeared to have been asleep, in line with their indictment. Noel and Thomas admitted to falsifying the log entries however prevented jail time below a cope with federal prosecutors. Copies of a few of these logs had been included among the many paperwork launched Thursday, with the guards’ signatures redacted.

Epstein arrived on the Metropolitan Correctional Center on July 6, 2019. He spent 22 hours within the jail’s basic inhabitants earlier than officers moved him to the particular housing unit “due to the significant increase in media coverage and awareness of his notoriety among the inmate population,” in line with the psychological reconstruction of his dying.

Epstein later stated he was upset about having to put on an orange jumpsuit offered to inmates within the particular housing unit and complained about being handled like he was a “bad guy” regardless of being effectively behaved behind bars. He requested a brown uniform for his near-daily visits together with his attorneys.

During an preliminary well being screening, the 66-year-old stated that he had 10-plus feminine sexual companions throughout the earlier 5 years. Medical data confirmed he was affected by sleep apnea, constipation, hypertension, decrease again ache and prediabetes and had been beforehand handled for chlamydia.

Epstein did make some makes an attempt to adapt to his jailhouse environment, the data present. He signed up for a Kosher meal and informed jail officers, by means of his lawyer, that he needed permission to train exterior. Two days earlier than he was discovered lifeless, Epstein purchased $73.85 price of things from the jail commissary, together with an AM/FM radio and headphones. He had $566 left in his account when he died.

Epstein’s outlook worsened when a decide denied him bail on July 18, 2019 – elevating the prospect that he’d stay locked up till trial and, probably longer. If convicted, he confronted as much as 45 years jail. Four days later, Epstein was discovered on the ground of his cell with a strip of bedsheet round his neck.

Epstein survived. His accidents didn’t require going to the hospital. He was positioned on suicide watch and, later, psychiatric commentary. Jail officers famous in logs that they noticed him, “sitting at the edge of the bed, lost in thought,” and sitting “with his head against the wall.”

Epstein expressed frustration with the noise of the jail and his lack of sleep. His first few weeks on the Metropolitan Correctional Center, Epstein didn’t have his sleep apnea respiratory equipment he used. Then, the bathroom in his cell began performing up.

“He was still left in the same cell with a broken toilet,” the jail’s chief psychologist wrote in a electronic mail the subsequent day. “Please move him to the cell next door when he returns from legal as the toilet still does not work.”

The day earlier than Epstein ended his life, a federal decide unsealed about 2,000 pages of paperwork in a sexual abuse lawsuit towards him. That improvement, jail officers noticed, additional eroded Epstein’s earlier elevated standing.

That, mixed with an absence of great interpersonal connections and “the idea of potentially spending his life in prison were likely factors contributing to Mr. Epstein’s suicide,” officers wrote.

• Associated Press writers Sarah Brumfield in Silver Spring, Maryland, Ben Finley in Norfolk, Virginia, Sam Metz in Salt Lake City, Jake Offenhartz and David B. Caruso in New York, Russ Bynum in Savanah, Georgia, Gene Johnson in Seattle and Brooke Schultz in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, contributed to this report.