FW: Epstein and SDNY in 2016

Stephen Brown at the Daily News is working on a story for next Tuesday about Epstein, Maxwell, and pitches made by victims' lawyers to in 2016 that "went nowhere." His email below explains further. His actual questions are at the end of his email. He has no expectations about guidance, but would appreciate any. Don't know if we should be forwarding this to presumably Stephen could contact her on his own.

From: Brown, Stephen sbrown@nydailynews.com
Sent: Thursday, October 8, 2020 4:40 PM
To: Margolin,
Subject: Epstein and SDNY in 2016

H= Here's a rundown of the story I'm working on. Am seeking guidance from SDNY on the office's thinking at the time, if FBI was looped in, and who the decision-maker was on this. Apologies for the long email but I figure better to provide as much detail as possible. My editors are pretty interested in this one.

On Feb. 29, 2016, Epstein victims' attorneys Stan Pottinger, Brad Edwards and Peter Skinner met with then-AUSA and pitched her on an investigation of the Epstein scheme. I'm told Kramer had questions about establishing venue, the South Florida NPA, statute of limitations issues and the general Dal tradition of not second-guessing another US Attorney. She wondered if the attorneys were proposing an investigation of new conduct, or rather a re-do of the South Florida case. (This is all from sources familiar).

According to Edwards's book, the team of attorneys left the meeting feeling hopeful.

The AUSA acted confident that a case would be brought against Epstein for crimes committed against Virginia and others in New York. Of course, first she had to have facts, witnesses, evidence, and victims of a New York crime. We assured the prosecutor that the number of victims in New York far exceeded those discovered in Florida. The group walked out excited that New York was finally going to bring a case against Epstein. I said to David and Pete, "Don't hold your breath, the Southern District obviously doesn't know who they're dealing with yet:"

The effort went nowhere, as far as the victims' attorneys know. Then, after attorneys David Boies and Sigrid McCawley took Maxwell's depositions in the case, Boies re-approached SDNY, I'm told. The meeting took place in August or September between Boies, Pottinger and Kramer. They pitched SDNY on charging Maxwell with perjury. They also believed Epstein, who was paying Maxwell's legal bills, was in a perjury conspiracy. They saw this as a work-around to Kramer's concerns about the NPA etc.

But that also went nowhere. Obviously everything changed after the Miami Herald articles and SDNY opened an investigation under Berman.

In addition to the headline that SDNY initially passed on tackling the case, this story will also note how the contact between victims' attorneys and SDNY relates to the perjury counts in Maxwell's criminal case. She's said in filings she was

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the victim of a "perjury trap," presumably set by Boies in cahoots with SONY. (From her perspective).

Questions: Why didn't SDNY pursue the Epstein case in 2016? Why didn't it pursue perjury counts? Did SDNY contact the FBI or South Florida prosecutors about Epstein during that period? Who was the decision maker after Kramer met with the victims' attorneys? Did Preet make the call?

This story is tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, so this is not super urgent. Hope to hear from you tomorrow.

Thanks,

Stephen Rex Brown
Manhattan Federal Court reporter
NY DAILY NEWS
917-589-9831

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