Mystery surrounds the Jeffrey Epstein files after Bondi claims ‘tens of thousands’ of videos

Washington – It was a surprising declaration of the Attorney General Pam Bondi, because the Trump administration promises to publish more files of his investigation into sexual trafficking on Jeffrey Epstein: the FBI, she said, reviewed “tens of thousands of videos” from the rich financial “with children or children.”

The commentary, made to journalists of the White House after a remark similar to a stranger with a hidden camera, raised the challenges of the administration of President Donald Trump to prove that he has in his possession of unprecedented convincing evidence. This task is all the more pressing after a dumping ground of previous documents that Bondi angry the elements of the Trump base by not delivering new bombs and as managers of the administration who had promised to unlock supposed secrets of the so-called government “deep state” struggles to make this commitment.

However, weeks after Bondi’s remarks, it is not clear what it was referring to.

The Associated Press was maintained with people involved as lawyers or lawsuits in law enforcement in criminal affairs of Epstein and the former girlfriend of the worldly Ghislaine Maxwell who said that she had not seen and did not know a mine of recordings like what Bondi described. The accusation acts and detention memos do not refer to the existence of Epstein videos with children, and none have been accused of possession of sexual abuse equipment, even if this offense would have been much easier to prove than the number of sex traffic they have been confronted.

A potential index can reside in a judicial file little encouraged in 2023 – among hundreds of documents examined by the AP – in which the succession of Epstein has been revealed to have located an undeveloped number of videos and photos which, according to him, could contain sexual abuse equipment on children. But even it remains enveloped in secrecy of the lawyers involved in this civil affair saying that a protective order prevents them from discussing.

The file suggests a discovery of recordings after the conclusion of criminal affairs, but if this is what Bondi refers, the Ministry of Justice has not said.

The ministry refused repeated AP requests to speak with officials supervising the Epstein exam. The spokespersons did not answer a list of questions about Bondi’s comments, especially when and where the recordings were purchased, which they depict and if they were recently discovered when the authorities have dug their collection of evidence or were known for some time to have been in possession of the government.

“The external sources which make affirmations on the documents included in the doj examination cannot speak of the documents included in the doj exam,” spokesman Chad Gilmartin said in a statement.

Epstein’s crimes, very publicized connections and prison suicide made a magnet for conspiracy theorists and online detectives in search of evidence. Elon Musk entered the frenzy during his acrimonia benefits with Trump when he said without evidence in a publication of social media deleted since the reason why the Epstein files had not yet been published is that the republican president is presented there.

During an interview with Fox News Channel in February, Bondi suggested that an alleged “customer list” of Epstein was sitting on his desk. The next day, the Ministry of Justice distributed “declassified” linked binders to far -right influencers to the White House, but it quickly became clear that a large part of the information has long been in the public domain. No “list of customers” has been disclosed and there is no evidence that such a document exists.

The flop left the preservatives furious and failed to extinguish the theories of the conspiracy which for years have heard themselves in the case of Epstein. The person on the right Laura Loodor called Bondi to resign, by making him the mark a “total liar”.

Subsequently, Bondi said that a “source” of the FBI informed him of the existence of thousands of pages of documents not disclosed before and ordered the office to provide “complete and complete EPSTEIN files”, including all videos. Since then, the employees have recorded hours of examining the files to prepare them for the release. We don’t know when it could happen.

In April, Bondi was approached in a restaurant by a woman with a hidden camera that asked questions about the version of the Epstein files. Bondi replied that there were tens of thousands of videos “and that’s it with small children”, so she said that the FBI had to go by everyone.

After conservative activist James O’Keefe, who later obtained and published the hidden camera video, alerted the Ministry of Justice on the meeting, Bondi told journalists at the White House: “There are tens of thousands of Epstein videos with children or juvenile pornography.”

The comments have exploited long -standing suspicions that, despite the release during the years of thousands of documents documenting Epstein’s activities, details harmful about it or other eminent personalities remain hidden.

The situation was still muddy by recent comments from FBI Director Kash Patel at the Podcaster Joe Rogan, who did not repeat the Bondi account on tens of thousands of videos.

Although he was not explicitly questioned on Bondi, Patel rejected the possibility of incriminating videos of powerful friends of Epstein, saying: “If there was a video of a guy or a girl committing crimes on an island and that I am in charge, don’t you think you would see it?” When asked if the story “might not be correct that there was a video of these guys who did this,” he replied “exactly”.

Epstein’s suicide in August 2019, weeks after his arrest, prevented a trial in New York and interrupted the discovery process in which the evidence is shared between lawyers.

But even in a later prosecution of Maxwell, in which such evidence would probably have been relevant given the nature of the accusations against an alleged co-conspirator, Epstein Salaces videos with children have never surfaced and have been part of the case, said one of his lawyers.

“We have never been provided with any of these documents. I suspect that if they existed, we would have seen them, and I have never seen them, so I have no idea what she is talking about,” said Jeffrey Pagliuca, who represented Maxwell in a trial in 2021 in which she was found guilty of having attracted adolescent girls to be attacked by Epstein.

Admittedly, photographs of naked or semi -semi -old girls have been known for a long time to be part of the case. Investigators perhaps recovered thousands of these photos while searching his Manhattan manor, and a promenade on video by the police of his Palm beach, Florida, revealed sexually suggestive photographs displayed inside, according to the judicial archives.

The accounts of more than one accuser to feel looked at or to see cameras or surveillance equipment in Epstein properties have contributed to the expectations of the public of sexual recordings. A report from the Bureau of Professional Responsibilities of the Ministry of Justice of the 2020 on the treatment of an Epstein previous survey referred to this possibility, claiming that the police who had searched his house in Palm Beach in 2005 found computer keyboards, monitors and disconnected surveillance cameras, but equipment – including video recordings and other electronic articles – was missing.

There is no indication that the prosecutors obtained missing equipment during the last federal investigation, and the indictment against him included any allegation of registration.

An AP examination of hundreds of documents in the criminal affairs of Maxwell and Epstein did not identify any reference to tens of thousands of Epstein videos with minor girls.

“I do not remember that personally, never had this kind of discussion,” said an Epstein lawyer, Marc Fernich, who could not exclude such evidence not being located later. “It’s not something I have ever heard of.”

In a reference not specific to video evidence, prosecutors said in a 2020 file that they would produce Maxwell lawyers thousands of images and videos of Epstein electronic devices in response to a mandate.

But Pagliuca said his memories were largely consistent in recordings in which Epstein “thought” of a recording device-“Epstein speaking to Epstein,” he said.

Complicated efforts to assess the evidence of Epstein are the volume of accusers, judicial cases and districts where legal quarrels took place, including after the suicide of Epstein and the conviction of Maxwell.

Affairs include prosecution of 2022 before the Manhattan Federal Court with an accuser identified as Jane Doe 1 and in the American Virgin Islands, where Epstein had a house, alleging that the financial services giant Jpmorgan Chase did not take into account the red flags on the fact that he was a “high -risk” client.

Lawyers have published an assignment for any video recording or photos that could strengthen their case.

They told a judge of months later that the Epstein domain had alerted them that he had found content that could contain images of sexual abuses “while responding to the assignment and asked for a protocol to manage” documents and photographs recorded on videos. “The judge ordered representatives of Epstein’s succession to examine the documents before producing them to lawyers and alerting the FBI with possible sexual abuse imagery on children.

The judicial files do not detail the evidence or do not say how many videos or images have been found, and it is not clear if the recorded recordings were the same.

The disclosure of the succession was then included by a lawyer for complainants, Jennifer Freeman, in a complaint with the FBI and the Ministry of Justice claiming that investigators had failed over the years to adequately perceive potential evidence of sexual abuse materials on children.

Freeman quoted Bondi’s comments in a new trial on behalf of an accuser of Epstein who alleged that he attacked her in 1996. In an interview, Freeman said that she had not seen recordings and had no direct knowledge but wanted to understand what Bondi meant.

“I want to know what she is talking about, what she is talking about-I would like to know,” she said.

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The journalist of Associated Press, Aaron Kessler, in Washington, contributed to this report.