August 12, 2019, 05:06 PM
bigdealBillionaire Jeffrey Epstein arrested and charged with sex trafficking
From the sound of what I read today, Mr. Barr is not very happy about any of this, nor should he be. I think about the best the government can hope for in the final report on this is that they're found to be utterly incompetent. Regardless, this whole debacle is not much of a confidence booster for a public that's seen a whole lotta failures from the FBI and DOJ over the last few years.
August 12, 2019, 05:59 PM
Skins2881I'd drive that bad boy all over town. That's awesome.
No conspiracy theories for me, but I do like the laugh at the heightened rate of suicide that people associated with the Clinton's experience. They've probably only actually had one or two suicided in reality. That Babylon Bee article on last page had me laughing my ass off.
August 12, 2019, 06:07 PM
sdyand this from NY Post
https://nypost.com/2019/08/12/...son-bedsheet-source/Jeffrey Epstein was found hanging in his Lower Manhattan jail cell with a bedsheet wrapped around his neck and secured to the top of a bunk bed, The Post has learned.
The convicted pedophile, who was 6 feet tall, apparently killed himself by kneeling toward the floor and strangling himself with the makeshift noose, a law enforcement source said Monday.
August 12, 2019, 06:57 PM
rhquote:
Originally posted by sdy:
and this from NY Post
Jeffrey Epstein was found hanging in his Lower Manhattan jail cell with a bedsheet wrapped around his neck and secured to the top of a bunk bed, The Post has learned.
More information is now flowing out. According the New York Times, Epstein was left unmonitored for hours, and one of his guards was not even a corrections officer. I am hesitant to share a New York Times article, but it has the most complete information that I've currently seen. (Of course they're trying to fault the Trump administration.)
In Short-Staffed Jail, Epstein Was Left Alone for Hours; Guard Was SubstituteAugust 12, 2019, 07:54 PM
rhThat's why I was reluctant to post a link to a NY Times article and included a synopsis for those not caring to click on the link. I would have just copied the text and included the link as a reference, but it's a long article with not much else new in it besides my synopsis.
August 12, 2019, 07:59 PM
Skins2881Here you go rh:
One of the two people guarding Jeffrey Epstein when he apparently hanged himself in a federal jail cell was not a full-fledged correctional officer, and neither guard had checked on Mr. Epstein for several hours before he was discovered, prison and law-enforcement officials said.
Those details emerged on Monday as Attorney General William P. Barr sharply criticized the management of the federal jail in Manhattan where Mr. Epstein, who was accused of sexually abusing dozens of teenage girls, was found dead on Saturday morning.
“We are now learning of serious irregularities at this facility that are deeply concerning and demand a thorough investigation,” said Mr. Barr, who, as the country’s top law enforcement official, is responsible for federal prisons.
“We will get to the bottom of what happened,” he added. “There will be accountability.”
Mr. Barr did not offer additional information about the problems at the jail, but questions have been raised about why Mr. Epstein had been taken off suicide watch just days after apparently trying to kill himself and then was left alone in a cell without close supervision.
Mr. Barr also said Mr. Epstein’s suicide would not halt the investigation into other people who might have helped him traffic teenage girls for sex. On Monday, F.B.I. agents and New York detectives raided Mr. Epstein’s private, 70-acre island in the United States Virgin Islands, looking for documents, photographs, videos, computers and other materials, people briefed on the matter said.
“Any co-conspirators should not rest easy,” Mr. Barr said. “The victims deserve justice and they will get it.”
No correctional officer had checked on Mr. Epstein for several hours before he was found, even though guards were supposed to look in on prisoners in the protective unit where he was housed every half-hour, a prison official and two law-enforcement officials with knowledge of the detention said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
In addition, only one of the two people guarding the Special Housing Unit — known as 9 South — normally worked as a correctional officer, according to three prison officials with knowledge of the case. The officials did not say what sort of job the other employee usually worked.
A New York Times investigation published last year detailed this practice, under which federal prisons are so strapped for correctional officers that they regularly compel teachers, nurses, secretaries and other support staff members to step in. The practice has grown at some prisons as the Trump administration has curtailed the hiring of correctional officers.
Many of these staff members only receive a few weeks’ training in correctional work, and, while required by contract to serve as substitutes, are often uncomfortable in the roles. Even workers who previously held correctional positions have said that the practice was unsettling because fewer colleagues were on hand to provide backup if things turned ugly.
Mr. Epstein’s death came just two weeks after he had been taken off suicide watch at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Lower Manhattan, where he apparently had tried to kill himself on July 23, officials said.
He was being held at the detention center awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges. He had been accused of luring dozens of underage girls into giving him erotic massages and engaging in other sexual acts at his mansions in New York City and Palm Beach, Fla.
“I was appalled, and indeed the whole department was, and frankly angry, to learn of the M.C.C.’s failure to adequately secure this prisoner,” Mr. Barr said at a conference in New Orleans for the Grand Lodge Fraternal Order of Police.
That Mr. Epstein was taken off suicide watch and left unsupervised long enough to have apparently taken his own life has sparked a public outcry, prompting criticism of the Justice Department and the Bureau of Prisons, which operates the Manhattan jail. Mr. Barr announced Saturday that both the F.B.I. and the Justice Department’s inspector general would open respective probes into the circumstances surrounding Mr. Epstein’s death.
The Bureau of Prisons declined to comment.
Union officials said that for more than a year officials in Washington had been made aware of a severe staffing shortage at the facility in the wake of a federal hiring freeze. One of the guards on the unit where Mr. Epstein died had been working overtime for five straight days, while the other had been forced to work overtime that day, a union official said.
“The Council of Prison Locals has been sounding the alarm about the hiring freeze,” said Eric Young, the president of the union that represents federal prison workers across the country.
An autopsy of Mr. Epstein’s body was conducted by the city’s medical examiner on Sunday, but a final determination is pending. At the request of Mr. Epstein’s lawyers, a private pathologist was permitted to attend the examination, which the city’s chief medical examiner, Dr. Barbara Sampson, called a “routine practice.”
Since leaving suicide watch on July 29, Mr. Epstein had been housed in 9 South, a secure housing unit in one of the prison’s most restrictive wings. His lifeless body was found in his cell around 6:30 a.m., by a guard conducting morning rounds. He had used a bedsheet to hang himself, one official said.
Mr. Epstein was being housed alone. Under normal procedures, he should have had a cellmate, but the inmate housed with him had been recently transferred and had not been replaced, several officials said.
According to Bureau of Prisons' policy, several high-ranking prison officials would have had to have approved Mr. Epstein’s removal from the facility’s suicide prevention program, including the prison’s chief psychologist.
Ali Watkins
Katie Benner
