What we found inside thousands of new Epstein files – and why cries of cover up and conspiracy will rumble on
The celebrities, the victims, the redactions.
US correspondent Mark Stone has been wading through the thousands of new documents and images released last night – and has split his analysis into these three strands.
Watch Stone’s detailed breakdown of the new release and what we’ve discovered so far – or scroll down for a summary…
The celebrities
Stone says we already knew Jeffrey Epstein socialised widely, with a network spanning the arts, business, politics, royalty and high society – so, as we’ve been stressing throughout, association with him does not equate to wrongdoing.
But there are many recognisable names in this latest wave of information – from Michael Jackson and Diana Ross, to former US president Bill Clinton.
“He features a lot in this dump of images,” Stone says of Clinton. “His association with Epstein is well known. And he is on record expressing his regret at having ever known him.”
Meanwhile, Donald Trump barely features in this new release (see our 7.00 post for analysis by James Matthews on that).
Mick Jagger and Kevin Spacey are among the other famous faces pictured – but Stone notes none of these images have been released with any context. They are merely all part of the Epstein estate – seized over the years, and sealed until now.
The former prince Andrew, and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, also feature in images from the files. Andrew has always denied any wrongdoing in connection to Epstein. He settled out of court with the now deceased Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein’s victims, who accused him of sexual assault.
The victims
The department of justice says it redacted more than 1,200 names or images of victims and their relatives.
One image from the new batch of files pictures two young women, perhaps girls, in Paris – their identities have been redacted.
There are also message pads with notes taken from phone calls. One says: “I have a girl for him.” But we don’t know who wrote the notes.
Then there’s a scrapbook, similar to the previously released birthday book given to Epstein. The birthday book was collated as a gift by his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.
Stone says of the scrapbook: “It’s heavily redcated and very disturbing, to be honest.”
One page features a caption saying: “Once upon a time, there was a clueless little girl.”
The redactions
A trove of images of girls is redacted in the new files.
Stone says the rationale for why some images and documents have been redacted is not clear.
“That is a really big issue,” he says – highlighting in particular a grand jury document which was redacted in full, and other inconsistencies.
“With every black line, someone will cry cover up – and the conspiracy rumbles on,” Stone says.
He points to a remarkable disclaimer on the US department of justice website, which says it might have inadvertently failed in places to redact information.
This hardly suggests confidence in a job well done, Stone concludes.
