When the FBI investigated Jeffrey Epstein two decades ago, he “hired private PIs to investigate the investigators,” per one law enforcement official.

Multiple federal law enforcement officials who spoke to Rolling Stone on the condition of anonymity say that Jeffrey Epstein hired private investigators to follow, intimidate, and surveil FBI special agents investigating allegations that he paid underage women for sex. The FBI declined Rolling Stone’s request for comment.

These new allegations about the pressure exerted on the FBI come after internal divisions in Donald Trump’s administration exploded into public view last week over its handling of files and information pertaining to the disgraced financier and accused sex trafficker.

Reports across several media outlets describe a tense meeting between deputy FBI director Dan Bongino, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and other officials. According to reports, that meeting ended with Bongino storming out. Bongino is now reportedly considering resigning from his post at the FBI.

  • DoctorNope@lemmy.world
    45·
    4 days ago

    I gotta say, it feels like a breach of journalistic ethics bordering on criminal negligence for this article to state that

    In 2018, one year after the former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Alexander Acosta, was appointed as Trump’s Secretary of Labor, The Miami Herald began publishing a sweeping series of investigations alleging that Acosta had engineered an unprecedented and illegal plea deal for Epstein, using emails between Acosta and Epstein’s attorneys to detail how a confoundingly light sentence came to pass. The deal, which Epstein took, allowed him to plead to state charges of soliciting and procuring a minor and paved the way for him to serve time through a work release program, thus evading a potential life sentence and federal charges. He also secured a non-prosecution agreement which barred Epstein’s victims from bringing claims against him while simultaneously shielding his co-conspirators from prosecution.

    And somehow fail to mention the name of the Florida state attorney general at the time, because it seems somewhat relevant.

    It was Pam Bondi.