July 6, 2019. Teterboro Airport, New Jersey. Jeffrey Epstein steps off a flight from Paris and into federal custody.
Nine days later, on July 15, four wire transfers land at HBRK Associates in Manhattan. All four originate from the same address: Southern Trust Company, Inc., 6100 Red Hook Quarter, Suite B-3, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands.
$1,000,000. $1,000,000. $1,000,000. $1,500,000.1
$4.5 million. One day. Four accounts. The founder is in a federal holding cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center. The machine doesn't notice.
Day Ten
The disbursements begin immediately.
July 16: $6,882 — "HBRK JEGE ACH." The aircraft operation is still funded. July 17: ADP payroll — $6,724.55. Staff still getting paid. A check clears for $213,092.2
The machine has a simple logic. Money arrives at HBRK from Southern Trust. HBRK pays the bills. It doesn't require Jeffrey Epstein to be free, or conscious, or alive. It requires Richard Kahn at 575 Lexington Avenue to process the queue.
Three days before the arrest — July 3 — Kahn was on a conference call working through "Jeffrey's Punch List" with the full operations team: Myla Trestiza, Ann Rodriguez, Michael Glidden.3 Twelve days after the arrest, the punch list is still being punched.
The Defense Fund
August 2, 2019. Three wire transfers, $100,000 each, all on the same day:4
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| Leah Saffian Inc. | $100,000 |
| Cohen and Gresser LLP | $100,000 |
| Haddon, Morgan and Foreman | $100,000 |
Leah Saffian: publicist and crisis PR. Cohen and Gresser: Ghislaine Maxwell's defense attorneys. Haddon, Morgan and Foreman: Colorado-based litigation firm. Three firms, three $100,000 wires, one business day. Legal defense on autopilot.
The money came from Ghislaine Maxwell's UBS account — the same account that would keep paying Saffian for months. $100,000 on August 2. Another $100,000 on August 12. $66,963.45 on November 1.5 Total crisis PR spend from that single account: $266,963.
August 1: $25,500 ACH settlement — "HBRK ZORRO ACH TRANS." The ranch in Stanley, New Mexico is still operational. Still drawing funds from the Manhattan nerve center, 1,800 miles away.2
Maxwell's Parallel Scramble
While Southern Trust was flooding HBRK with cash, Ghislaine Maxwell was running her own operation. On July 26 — twenty days after Epstein's arrest:
Deposit of $308,105 by MISS GHISLAINE MAXWELL from Barclays UK (BUKBGB22)6
The same day: $150,000 wired to Cohen and Gresser. Her defense attorneys, paid within hours of the British deposit clearing.
Five days later, July 31: a second deposit — $304,930, again from Barclays UK. Over $600,000 transferred from British accounts in under a week.
She was simultaneously shutting down TerraMar — her ocean conservation nonprofit — and routing funds through Tidewood LLC to Scott Borgerson. The Montpelier Trust at UBS had been distributing: $500,000 in March 2019, $240,000 to Tidewood in June, $52,580 quarterly to Borgerson through USAA.6
Two financial operations running in parallel. His machine moving millions from the Caribbean to Manhattan. Hers moving hundreds of thousands from London to New York. Both running the same playbook: fund the lawyers, pay the staff, distribute before someone freezes the accounts.
6:33 AM
August 10, 2019. A clinical nurse at the Metropolitan Correctional Center documents what she finds: cold skin, circumferential bruising around the neck, pupils fixed and dilated.
Jeffrey Epstein is pronounced dead at 6:33 AM.
Two days later — August 12 — a wire transfer clears from Ghislaine Maxwell's UBS account: $100,000 to Leah Saffian Inc.5 Crisis PR. For a dead man's network.
Ten days after that — August 20 — another wire from the same account: $9,500 to Isabel Maxwell at Bank of America.4 Ghislaine paying her sister. The family financial network pulsing on.
Ghost Payroll
The ADP payroll system didn't know Jeffrey Epstein was dead. It wasn't designed to know.
HBRK ran payroll on two separate TD Bank accounts simultaneously. Every two weeks, like clockwork:2
| Date | Account 1 (Wages) | Account 2 (Wages) | Combined |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 14 | $6,724.53 | $5,257.02 | $11,981.55 |
| Aug 28 | $6,724.53 | $5,257.06 | $11,981.59 |
| Sep 11 | $6,724.57 | $5,257.02 | $11,981.59 |
| Sep 26 | $6,724.53 | $5,249.10 | $11,973.63 |
Plus payroll taxes — approximately $3,545 per cycle — and ADP processing fees at $59–$62 each run. Nearly $15,500 flowing out every two weeks to staff who were maintaining properties for a dead man.
Florida Power & Light kept billing the Palm Beach mansion. CenturyLink and Waste Management invoices kept arriving for Zorro Ranch. New Mexico Mutual collected insurance premiums. The lights stayed on. The trash got picked up. The ranch kept ranching.
On September 10, one month after death: a $19,040.80 credit arrived from Rolls-Royce PLC.7 Likely an aircraft engine service refund. The machine couldn't even stop receiving money.
Checks numbered 1081 through 1085, totaling approximately $185,000, cleared through September 2019. Someone was still signing checks.
Four Years Dead
The financial records don't end in 2019.
October 2023 — more than four years after Epstein's death:8
| Date | Amount | Recipient |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 12 | $675,000 | Carroll Park Investment LLC |
| Oct 2023 | $100,000 | Accounting services |
| Oct 2023 | $17,000 | Paychex payroll |
Paychex. Not ADP — the estate had switched payroll providers. But someone was still getting paid.
November 15, 2023. Two wires to the same firm on the same day:8
- $5,978,335.76 to Motley Rice LLC — SC IOLTA Account
- $380,195.00 to Motley Rice LLC — SC IOLTA Account
$6.36 million to a plaintiffs' litigation firm handling victim compensation. Motley Rice, the South Carolina powerhouse that helped bring down Big Tobacco. Now processing the financial aftermath of Jeffrey Epstein, four years after his death, from an IOLTA trust account in South Carolina.
December 2023: Multiple escrow payments — $1,255,000 to Link & Rockenbach PA and Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP.8
Even ADP got a final payment: $284.00 on December 22, 2023. A closing fee, presumably. The original payroll provider, paid off four and a half years after the man whose staff it paid was pronounced dead.
The Ledger
Total post-arrest financial activity documented in the records:8
| Credits | Debits | Transactions | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Post-arrest (Jul 6 – Aug 10) | ~$9.2M | ~$4.1M | 111 |
| Post-death (Aug 10 – 2023) | $54.4M | $678,820 | 225 |
| Total | $63.6M | $4.8M | 336 |
336 transactions. $63.6 million in credits. A financial machine that processed more money after its creator's arrest than most Americans will see in a lifetime.
What the Machine Was
Four previous articles in this series have documented the components. Twelve shell companies across four jurisdictions — each with a distinct operational role. 6,536 FedEx transactions that moved currency, legal documents, and research checks between six properties. An aviation fleet that burned through $75 million in documented spending. A $50 million pipeline from Leon Black that doubled its contractual amount with no explanation.
This article documents what happened when the man at the center was removed.
The answer: nothing changed. The wires kept wiring. The payroll kept paying. The ACH settlements kept settling. Zorro Ranch drew its $25,500 from Manhattan. The aircraft operation drew its funds through JEGE. The law firms drew their retainers. The staff drew their biweekly checks.
The machine was never designed to require Jeffrey Epstein's daily involvement. That was the point. HBRK Associates at 575 Lexington Avenue was the nerve center — Richard Kahn's office processed the queue, and the queue didn't stop because the founder was in a cell, or on a gurney, or in a coffin.
$4.5 million from the Caribbean on Day Nine. Ghost payroll through September. Rolls-Royce refunds in October. $6.36 million to victim compensation attorneys four years later.
The machine was built to outlive its creator. It did.
This is the final article in The Ghost Network series — documenting the twelve shell companies, logistics pipelines, aviation fleet, and $63.6 million in post-arrest transactions that reveal how Jeffrey Epstein's financial infrastructure was designed to run without him.
Sources & Documents
- EFTA01596142, EFTA01596095, EFTA01596159, EFTA01596073 — Four wire transfers from Southern Trust Company Inc., 6100 Red Hook Quarter B3, St. Thomas USVI to HBRK Associates TD Bank accounts, July 15, 2019. $4.5 million total. View →
- EFTA01596073, EFTA01596159 — HBRK Associates TD Bank account statements showing post-arrest/post-death disbursements: JEGE ACH, ADP payroll, ZORRO ACH settlements, check clearings. View →
- vol00009-efta01222061-pdf — Conference call participants July 3, 2019: Kahn, Trestiza, Rodriguez, Glidden. "Jeffrey's Punch List/Anna's list from June 30th." View →
- EFTA01307084 — Ghislaine Maxwell UBS account: $100,000 each to Leah Saffian Inc., Cohen and Gresser LLP, Haddon Morgan and Foreman (Aug 2); $9,500 to Isabel Maxwell (Aug 20). View →
- EFTA01307084 — Ghislaine Maxwell UBS account: $100,000 to Leah Saffian Inc. on Aug 12 (2 days post-death), $66,963.45 on Nov 1. Total crisis PR: $266,963.45. View →
- EFTA01275587 — Ghislaine Maxwell: $308,105 deposit from Barclays UK (BUKBGB22), July 26, 2019. Second deposit $304,930, July 31. View →
- EFTA01596095 — HBRK Associates: $19,040.80 incoming wire from Rolls-Royce PLC, September 10, 2019. View →
- Estate quarterly accounting records — Post-death transaction totals: 225 transactions, $54.4M credits. 2023 transactions: $6,358,530.76 to Motley Rice LLC, $675,000 to Carroll Park Investment LLC, $1,255,000 in escrow payments. $284 ADP closing fee, December 22, 2023.
