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Jeffrey Epstein Case Update: Investigation Reveals Secret Ties

Despite removing him as an investor in 2013, six years after he was accused of soliciting a minor, senior JP Morgan officials continued to communicate with convicted billionaire and sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein for years, according to a new investigation.

The claim, which was published in the Wall Street Journal on Friday, comes as JP Morgan, the largest bank in the world by assets, is being sued by an unnamed Epstein accuser and the US Virgin Islands, where Epstein owned a private island, for profiting from human trafficking by disregarded internal warning signs about his behavior.

The Journal claims that in 2011 and 2013, Epstein’s Upper East Side townhouse was visited by Mary Erdoes, the person in charge of JP Morgan’s $4 trillion asset and financial management division. Erdoes had previously stated, via a spokesman, that the only occasion she can recall Epstein “formally meeting” her was the day she sacked him as a client.

A month prior to the bank renewing Epstein’s borrowing authorizations, John Duffy, who oversaw JP Morgan’s private bank, is also said to have made a trip to the townhouse in early 2013. Between 2014 and 2017, the study says, Justin Nelson, a third JP Morgan officer, had around six meetings with the disgraced financier.

Some of the discussions were reportedly about a multibillion-dollar donor-advised charity fund that Epstein had presented to JP Morgan as a way to attract affluent customers in his network to the bank.

However, court documents related to the US Virgin Islands complaint seem to indicate that senior JP Morgan officials disregarded compliance officers’ requests to break relations with the bank, claiming that there was “lots of smoke.” There are many questions.

One compliance officer asked in an email from 2010: “See below the latest claims of an investigation related to child trafficking – are you still at ease with this client who is now a registered sex offender?”

The complaint asserts that JP Morgan employees were aware of Epstein’s actions. Senior executives once joked about his attraction to young females. Erdoes “received an email asking her whether Epstein was at an event ‘with Miley Cyrus,’” who was then the star of Disney’s Hannah Montana, in 2008, two years after Epstein had been accused of solicitation of a child in Florida.

JP Morgan was also accused of being aware that Epstein “routinely” withdrew $40,000–$80,000 in cash multiple times each month. In a deposition, Erdoes said that her company knew about Epstein’s alleged use of funds to bring “underage girls and young women” to his house seven years before the bank terminated his relationship with them.

Up until 2013, JP Morgan served as Epstein’s banker for 15 years. While awaiting prosecution on allegations that he trafficked young girls for prostitution, the billionaire committed suicide in 2019. JP Morgan has accused former CEO Jes Staley of deliberately taking part in Epstein’s misdeeds as part of the barrage of recent charges.

Later, Staley was the CEO of Barclays. He refutes the accusations. He was made to resign from his position in 2021 after an internal probe questioned the veracity of his account of his contact with Epstein.

The US Virgin Islands, the Epstein sexual abuse allegation, and the Jes Staley cases will all need long-serving JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon to testify under oath in court for up to seven hours next month. He has vehemently denied knowing anything about the bank’s considerations in deciding whether to keep Epstein as a client.

The article was initially published on- “Support the Guardian”(JP Morgan execs reportedly maintained contact with Epstein after dropping him as client | JP Morgan | The Guardian)