The Victims of Epstein are now Victimized One More Time by Trump and Bondi/DOJ

Survivors spoke during a news conference on the Epstein Files Transparency Act ahead of the House vote to release the files in November.Credit...Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times

 

Disappointed. Frustrated. Suspicious.

Whats been shown so far are a lot of redactions some pages long and just baby food and we know there were grown babies Epstein took advantage from so we need the hard stuff that others that saw the files have testified and said they are there.

By Matthew Goldstein and Mike Baker

Several of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims said Friday that Justice Department failed them with its partial release of files related to the federal investigations into Mr. Epstein’s decades-long sexual abuse of teen girls and young women. They said the release of thousands of pages of photographs and heavily redacted documents did little to shed new light on the investigations and the scope of Mr. Epstein’s crimes or conspirators.

“They are proving everything we have been saying about corruption and delayed justice,” said Jess Michaels, one of the earliest known victims of Mr. Epstein. “What are they protecting? The coverup continues.”

Ms. Michaels has said she was sexually assaulted by Mr. Epstein in 1991 when she was 22 years old and training to be a dancer. She was among the victims who lobbied for the bipartisan law that directed the Justice Department to release virtually everything it had gathered during its sex trafficking investigations of Mr. Epstein and one of his main enablers, Ghislaine Maxwell.

But the more than 13,000 files released on Friday were heavily redacted and not easily searchable.

“If everything is redacted, where is the transparency?” said Marijke Chartouni, who has said she was sexually abused by Mr. Epstein when she was 20 years old. 

Among the tens of thousands of pages was one document that did provide a long-sought window into the F.B.I.’s handling of Mr. Epstein’s case: The file showed that Maria Farmer, another of Mr. Epstein’s earliest victims, filed a federal “child pornography” complaint against him in 1996. But investigators did not begin to thoroughly scrutinize Mr. Epstein until about a decade later.

Ms. Farmer, who fought for years to get the F.B.I. to make public her complaint, said she felt “vindicated” to finally see the document but also was heartbroken at the knowledge that the F.B.I. did not act on her complaint.

“It’s a tremendous relief that she doesn’t have to continue to fight to prove her truth,” said Ms. Farmer’s sister, Annie Farmer. She noted, though, that she was disappointed by the general lack of transparency with Friday’s release.

“So many of the photos are irrelevant,” said Marina Larcerda, who has said Mr. Epstein sexually abused her when she was 14. She was an important witness in the 2019 federal investigation that led to the filing of sex trafficking charges against Mr. Epstein. But she only recently went public with her story.

“We have been let down,” Ms. Larcerda said. “We waited for this day to bring these other men who have been protected to justice.” 

More on the Jeffrey Epstein Case

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• Trump and Clinton: President Trump’s name is rarely mentioned in the batch of Jeffrey Epstein files that his Justice Department released. But the documents appear to focus significantly on material connected to former President Clinton, at a moment when Republicans have fought to shift public attention away from Epstein’s friendship with Trump.

• F.B.I. Ignored Complaint: A woman who once worked for Epstein filed a complaint to the F.B.I. about his interest in “child pornography” in 1996, about a decade before investigators began scrutinizing his predatory behavior.

• Andrew Farkas: The New York City real estate mogul had assured investors that his relationship with Epstein was for business only. But in emails obtained by The New York Times, Farkas told Epstein that he considered him one of his best friends.

• Pushing Republicans on Epstein: The top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, Representative Robert Garcia, has brought aggressive tactics and reality-show flair to investigating Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to President Trump.

• Ghislaine Maxwell: Epstein's co-conspirator asked a federal judge to set aside her December 2021 sex-abuse conviction, claiming that a series of constitutional violations had denied her a fair trial.

• Larry Summers Video: Harvard officials have opened a secret disciplinary investigation into at least two students for their roles in drawing scrutiny to the relationship between Epstein and the school’s former president, Larry Summers.