US Justice Department renews bid to unseal Jeffrey Epstein grand jury materials

The US Justice Department has renewed its request to unseal Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking grand jury materials.

It said Congress made clear in approving the release of investigative materials related to the prosecution of the late financier that documents such as the court records should be released.

US attorney for the southern district of New York, Jay Clayton, signed the submission in Manhattan federal court asking that the judge issue an expedited ruling allowing the materials to be released now that US President Donald Trump signed the action requiring the release of documents related to Epstein within 30 days.

The Justice Department said the Congressional action overrode existing law in a way that permits the unsealing of the grand jury records.

Judge Richard Berman previously denied a Trump administration request to make the Epstein grand jury transcripts public.

Judge Berman, who presided over Epstein’s 2019 case, ruled in August that a “significant and compelling reason” to deny the request and keep the transcripts sealed was that information contained in the transcripts “pales in comparison” to investigative information and materials already in the Justice Department’s possession.

The judge wrote that the government’s 100,000 pages of Epstein files and materials “dwarf the 70 odd pages of Epstein grand jury materials” and that the grand jury testimony “is merely a hearsay snippet of Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged conduct”.

Two other judges have also denied the public release of material from investigations into Epstein’s decades-long sexual abuse of young women and girls.

The Justice Department has said that the only witness to give evidence before the Epstein grand jury was an FBI agent who, the judge noted, “had no direct knowledge of the facts of the case and whose testimony was mostly hearsay”.

The agent gave evidence on June 18 2019, and July 2 2019. The rest of the grand jury presentation consisted of a PowerPoint slideshow and a call log. The July 2 session ended with grand jurors voting to indict Epstein.

Epstein was arrested on July 6 2019. He was found dead in his cell at a Manhattan federal jail on August 10 2019 in what authorities have ruled a suicide.