Jeffrey Epstein
The transfer got here shortly after the Justice Division requested a federal courtroom on Friday to unseal grand jury transcripts in Epstein’s intercourse trafficking case, because the administration tries to include a firestorm that erupted after it beforehand introduced it could not be releasing further authorities recordsdata from the case.
Associated | Justice Division asks courtroom to unseal Jeffrey Epstein grand jury data
A consultant of Dow Jones, the Journal’s writer, didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark Friday.
The letter revealed by The Wall Road Journal was reportedly collected by disgraced British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell as a part of a birthday album for Epstein years earlier than the rich financier was first arrested in 2006 and subsequently had a falling-out with Trump.
Trump denied writing the letter and promised to sue. He mentioned he spoke to each to the paper’s proprietor, Rupert Murdoch, and its prime editor, Emma Tucker, earlier than the story was printed and advised them the letter was “fake.”
“These are not my words, not the way I talk. Also, I don’t draw pictures,” the president wrote on social media.
The outlet described the contents of the letter however didn’t publish a photograph exhibiting it totally or present particulars on the way it got here to find out about it. The go well with was filed in federal courtroom in Miami.
Associated | Trump melts down after lewd letter to Jeffrey Epstein is made public
Earlier Friday, Deputy Lawyer Normal Todd Blanche filed motions in a separate federal courtroom urging them to unseal the Epstein transcripts in addition to these within the case in opposition to Maxwell, who was convicted of luring teenage women to be sexually abused by Epstein. Epstein killed himself in 2019 shortly after his arrest whereas awaiting trial.
The Justice Division’s announcement that it could not be making public any extra Epstein recordsdata enraged components of Trump’s base partially as a result of members of his personal administration had hyped the anticipated launch and stoked conspiracies across the well-connected financier.
The Justice Division mentioned within the courtroom filings that it’s going to work with with prosecutors in New York to make applicable redactions of victim-related data and different personally figuring out data earlier than transcripts are launched.
Todd Blanche
“Transparency on this course of is not going to be on the expense of our obligation underneath the regulation to guard victims,” Blanche wrote.
However regardless of the brand new push to launch the grand jury transcripts, the administration has not introduced plans to reverse course and launch different proof in its possession. Lawyer Normal Pam Bondi had hyped the discharge of extra supplies after the primary Epstein recordsdata disclosure in February sparked outrage as a result of it contained no new revelations.
A decide must approve the discharge of the grand jury transcripts, and it is prone to be a prolonged course of to determine what can develop into public and to make redactions to guard delicate witness and sufferer data.
The data would present testimony of witnesses and different proof that was offered by prosecutions in the course of the secret grand jury proceedings, when a panel decides whether or not there’s sufficient proof to convey an indictment, or a proper legal cost.
