Two victims of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein questioned the Trump administration’s motives for searching for to unseal grand jury testimony in letters to the court docket made public Monday.
The victims, each nameless, wrote individually to U.S. District Choose Richard Berman to talk up for themselves and fellow victims whom they steered weren’t being adequately thought of within the authorities’s quest to make the papers public.
“I am not sure the highest priority here is the victims, justice for the victims or combatting child exploitation, or at least I do not feel this way,” one sufferer wrote, asserting that the Division of Justice (DOJ) and FBI’s precedence appears to be defending “wealthy men.”
The opposite sufferer stated their resolution to talk out comes with “disdain, disgust and fear” over how DOJ has dealt with its efforts to launch the so-called “Epstein Files.”
“Dear United States, I wish you would have handled and would handle the whole ‘EpsteinFiles’ with more respect towards and for the victims,” that sufferer wrote. “I’m not some pawn in your political warfare.
“What you have done and continue to do is eating at me day after day as you help to perpetuate this story indefinitely,” they continued.
The Trump administration’s renewed efforts to launch contemporary details about Epstein and his confederate, Ghislaine Maxwell, follows sharp criticism from his political base which has lengthy referred to as for higher transparency across the case.
The Justice Division introduced earlier this yr that Epstein didn’t have a “client list” and confirmed his 2019 loss of life was certainly a suicide, angering conspiracists who consider the federal government has hid the reality about Epstein and Maxwell’s intercourse trafficking scheme.
President Trump has grown more and more pissed off as his supporters have pressed for extra info or the appointment of a particular prosecutor. In current weeks, high DOJ officers have opened talks with Maxwell.
The victims argued that the eye to Epstein has gone too far.
“The latest attention on the ‘Epstein Files,’ the ‘Client List’ is OUT OF CONTROL and the ones that are left to suffer are not the high-profile individuals, IT IS THE VICTIMS,” the primary sufferer stated. “Why the lack of concern in handling such sensitive information for the victims sake?”
Neither sufferer explicitly referred to as for the transcripts to stay below seal, however each urged nice warning in figuring out what info ought to be launched.
Tuesday is the deadline for Epstein’s victims to reply to the federal government’s request to unseal the papers, and the choose stated he would rule “expeditiously” afterward.
