Feds say video of Jeffrey Epstein cell 'no longer exists' — accidentally destroyed by jail staff, oops
Video taken of Jeffrey Epstein's cell on the night of his first suicide attempt was deleted by mistake, according to federal prosecutors
Just keeps getting weirder, doesn't it.
Video of the jail cell where pedophile and accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein is reported to have made his first suicide attempt was accidentally destroyed, federal authorities say.
New development in the missing (then found) video from MCC during Jeffrey Epstein's suicide attempt.
Government now says the video wasn't preserved, after all. Unbelievable. pic.twitter.com/FLcaLcOAfT
- Stephen Brown (@PPVSRB) January 9, 2020
In a letter Thursday to the judge in Epstein's sex-trafficking case, federal prosecutors said that despite a recent statement that yes, they had the video, somehow the staff at the Metropolitan Correctional Center "inadvertently preserved video from the wrong tier," and the video from the correct one "no longer exists."
Feds accidentally preserved footage of the wrong cell during Jeffrey Epstein's suicide attempt.
A backup system for video footage at MCC also wasn't working, prosecutors say, meaning the surveillance vid is gone. https://t.co/ui7NPGHlGu- Stephen Brown (@PPVSRB) January 9, 2020
Alrighty then.
From the Daily Beast:
The surveillance footage was requested by Epstein's cellmate, accused killer ex-cop Nicholas Tartaglione, who is hoping it will show he "acted appropriately" and earn him a break at sentencing.
Last month, federal prosecutors said the video had been found. But in a letter to the judge on Thursday, they said it turns out that staff at the Metropolitan Correctional Center "inadvertently preserved video from the wrong tier," and the video from the correct one "no longer exists."
(...) Epstein was sharing a cell with Tartaglione-who faces a possible death sentence if convicted of four murders-when he was found semiconscious with marks on his neck July 23. It was initially unclear if he tried to harm himself or was attacked, but he was moved to the Special Housing Unit and put on suicide watch. After a prison psychologist later approved his removal from suicide watch, Epstein was found dead in his cell, with a noose made from a torn sheet, on Aug. 10.
Feel free to go nuts with your random "Jeffrey Epstein Didn't Kill Himself" theories, this news won't help clear anything up.
Read the rest at The Daily Beast.
NBC News: Federal prosecutors say that video taken from outside of Jeffrey Epstein's cell the night of his FIRST suicide attempt in July has been permanently deleted because MCC saved video from the wrong tier of the jail and not the tier Epstein was on, a filing says.
- Tom Winter (@Tom_Winter) January 9, 2020