Palm Beach Post article on Epstein solicitation charge and police probe, 2006

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Simkin, 27, also a yoga teacher.¶

The loss of talented teachers pains members of the local yoga community.¶

“It’s a terrific thing for him, but it’s terrible to have him leave,” said Merrill Katz, who taught Simkin and sent her to Elsner for further training. “He’s one of the most knowledgeable teachers we have in this area, and she was always very talented.”¶

Elsner, who lives in Delray Beach, spe-¶

teaches Thai massage.¶

Simkin, of Boynton Beach, took her first yoga classes with Katz as a college student and almost immediately decided to become a teacher. She specializes in flow yoga, which, like Ashtanga, consists of a series of postures connected by breathing techniques.¶

They are not the first to make the¶

See YOGA, 6B ▶¶

TAYLOR JONES/Staff Photographer¶

or kicks¶

Sports British Soccer Camp at Okeeheelee each; Blake Weger (center), 5, of Wellington; kicking drills.¶

After long probe, billionaire faces solicitation charge¶

By LARRY KELLER¶

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer¶

Palm Beach billionaire Jeffrey Epstein paid to have underage girls and young women brought to his home, where he received massages and sometimes sex, according to an investigation by the Palm Beach Police Department.¶

Palm Beach police spent months sifting through Epstein’s trash and watching his waterfront home and Palm Beach International Airport to keep tabs on his private jet. An indictment charging Epstein, 53, was¶

Epstein¶

unsealed Monday, charging him with one count of felony solicitation of prostitution.¶

Palm Beach police thought there was probable cause to charge Epstein with unlawful sex acts with a minor and lewd and lascivious molestation.¶

Police Chief Michael Reiter was so angry with State Attorney Barry Krischer’s handling of the case that he wrote a memo¶

See EPSTEIN, 5B ▶¶

newly negotiated proposal for beachfront¶

commission at 4 p.m. Thursday. If the commission approves the agreement, the city will take it to the county to secure $5 million from a recreation bond that was slated for beach redevelopment three years ago. County commissioners extended the deadline until July 31 so the city could present a beach redevelopment plan to keep the bond money.¶

If city commissioners endorse the §19.1¶

million plan, city staff will draft development, lease and financial agreements with Greater Bay over the next few weeks. Greater Bay proposes to overhaul the casino building, the pool and parking lot and provide landscaping.¶

This week, negotiations centered on the developer’s and city’s obligations for the project including fiscal, maintenance and¶

See BEACH, 6B ▶¶

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W S C THE¶

Police kept watch on home, airport, sift¶

EPSTEIN from 1B¶

suggesting the county’s top prosecutor disqualify himself.¶

“I must urge you to examine the unusual course that your office’s handling of this matter has taken and consider if good and sufficient reason exists to require your disqualification from the prosecution of these cases,” Reiter wrote in a May 1 memo to Krischer.¶

While not commenting specifically on the Epstein case, Mike Edmondson, spokesman for the state attorney, said his office presents cases other than murders to a grand jury when there are questions about witnesses’ credibility and their ability to testify.¶

By the nature of their jobs, police officers look at evidence from a “one-sided perspective,” Edmondson said.¶

“A prosecutor has to look at it in a much broader fashion,” weighing the veracity of witnesses and how they may fare under defense attorneys’ questioning, he said.¶

Epstein’s attorney, Jack Goldberger, said his client committed no crimes.¶

“The reports and statements in question refer to false accusations that were not charged because the Palm Beach County state attorney questioned the credibility of the witnesses,” Goldberger¶

said. A county grand jury “found the allegations wholly unsubstantiated and not credible,” and that’s why his client was not charged with sexual activity with minors, he said.¶

Goldberger said Epstein passed a lie detector test administered by a reputable polygraph examiner in which he said he did not know the girls were minors. Also, a search warrant served on Epstein’s home found no evidence to corroborate the girls’ allegations, Goldberger said.¶

According to police documents:¶

A Palm Beach Community College student said she gave Epstein a massage in the nude, then brought him six girls, ages 14 to 16, for massage and sex-tinged sessions at his home.¶

A 27-year-old woman who worked as Epstein’s personal assistant also facilitated the liaisons, phoning the PBCC student to arrange for girls when Epstein was coming to town. And she escorted the girls upstairs when they arrived, putting fresh sheets on a massage table and placing massage oils nearby.¶

Police took sworn statements from five alleged victims and 17 witnesses. They contend that on three occasions, Epstein had sex with the girls.¶

The chief’s letter¶

See the letter Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter wrote to State Attorney Barry Krischer on the Epstein case.¶

PalmBeachPost.com¶

A money manager for the ultra-rich, Epstein was named one of New York’s most eligible bachelors in 2003 by The New York Post. He reportedly hobnobs with the likes of former President Clinton, former Harvard University President Summers and Donald Trump, and has lavish homes in Manhattan, New Mexico and the Virgin Islands.¶

He has contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Democratic Party candidates and organizations, including Sen. John Kerry’s presidential bid, and the Senate campaigns of Joe Lieberman, Hillary Clinton, Christopher Dodd and Charles Schumer.¶

Goldberger is one of five attorneys Epstein has retained since he became the subject of an investigation, Edmondson said. Among the others: Alan Dershowitz, the well-known Harvard law professor and author, who is a friend of Epstein. Dershowitz could not be reached for comment.¶

Police said the woman who enlisted young girls for Epstein was¶

20, of Royal Palm Beach. Robson has worked at an Olive Garden restaurant in Wellington and said she was a journalism major at Palm Beach Community College when she was questioned by police last October. She has an unlisted phone number and could not be reached for comment.¶

said she met Epstein when, at age 17, a friend asked her if she would like to make money giving him a massage. She said she was driven to his five-bedroom, 7½-bath home on the Intracoastal Waterway, then escorted upstairs to a bedroom with a massage table and oils. Epstein and were both naked during the massage, she said, but when he grabbed her buttocks, she said she didn’t want to be touched.¶

Epstein said he’d pay her to bring him more girls—the younger the better, told police. When she tried once to bring a 23-year-old woman to him, Epstein said she was too old, said.¶

who has not been charged in the case, said she eventually brought six girls to Epstein who were paid $200 each time, said. “I’m like a Heidi Fleiss,” police quoted her as saying. The girls knew what to expect when they were taken to Epstein’s home, said.¶

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THE PALM BEACH POST	◀	WEDNESDAY, JULY 26, 2006

5B¶

on home, airport, sifted through trash¶

The chief’s letter¶

See the letter Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter wrote to State Attorney Barry Krischer on the Epstein case.¶

PalmBeachPost.com¶

PalmBeachPost.com¶

A money manager for the ultra-rich, Epstein was named one of New York’s most eligible bachelors in 2003 by The New York Post. He reportedly hobnobs with the likes of former President Clinton, former Harvard University President Summers and Donald Trump, and has lavish homes in Manhattan, New Mexico and the Virgin Islands.¶

He has contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Democratic Party candidates and organizations, including Sen. John Kerry’s presidential bid, and the Senate campaigns of Joe Lieberman, Hillary Clinton, Christopher Dodd and Charles Schumer.¶

Goldberger is one of five attorneys Epstein has retained since he became the subject of an investigation, Edmondson said. Among the others: Alan Dershowitz, the well-known Harvard law professor and author, who is a friend of Epstein. Dershowitz could not be reached for comment.¶

Police said the woman who enlisted young girls for Epstein was¶

20 of Royal Palm Beach has worked at an Olive Garden restaurant in Wellington and said she was a journalism major at Palm Beach Community College when she was questioned by police last October. She has an unlisted phone number and could not be reached for comment.¶

said she met Epstein when, at age 17, a friend asked her if she would like to make money giving him a massage. She said she was driven to his five-bedroom, 7½-bath home on the Intracoastal Waterway, then escorted upstairs to a bedroom with a massage table and oils. Epstein and were both naked during the massage, she said, but when he grabbed her buttocks, she said she didn’t want to be touched.¶

Epstein said he’d pay her to bring him more girls—the younger the better, told police. When she tried once to bring a 23-year-old woman to him, Enstein said she was too old, said.¶

who has not been charged in the case, said she eventually brought six girls to Epstein who were paid $200 each time, said. “I’m like a Heidi Fleiss,” police quoted her as saying. The girls knew what to expect when they were taken to Epstein’s home, said.¶

Give a massage — maybe naked — and allow some touching.¶

One 14-year-old girl, Robson took to meet Epstein led police to start the investigation of him in March 2005. A relative of the girl called to say she thought the child had recently engaged in sex with a Palm Beach man. The girl then got into a fight with a classmate who accused her of being a prostitute, and she couldn’t explain why she had $300 in her purse.¶

The girl gave police this account of her meeting with Epstein:¶

She accompanied and a second girl to Epstein’s house on a Sunday in February 2005. Once there, a woman she thought was Epstein’s assistant told the girl to follow her upstairs to a room featuring a mural of a naked woman, several photographs of naked women on a shelf, a hot pink and green sofa and a massage table.¶

She stripped to her bra and panties and gave him a massage.¶

Epstein gave the 14-year-old $300 and she and the other girls left, she said. She said told her that Epstein paid her $200 that day.¶

Other girls told similar stories. In most accounts, Epstein’s personal assistant at the time, Sarah now 27, escorted the girls to Ep-¶

stein’s bedroom.¶

whose most recent known address is in North Carolina, has not been charged in the case.¶

Palm Beach police often conducted surveillance of Epstein’s home, and at Palm Beach International Airport to see if his private jet was there, so they would know when he was in town. Police also arranged repeatedly to receive his trash from Palm Beach sanitation workers, collecting papers with names and phone numbers, sex toys and female hygiene products.¶

One note stated that a female could not come over at 7 p.m. because of soccer. Another said a girl had to work Sunday — “Monday after school?” And still another note contained the work hours of a girl, saying she leaves school at 11:30 a.m. and would come over the next day at 10:30 a.m.¶

Only three months before the police department probe began, Epstein donated $90,000 to the department for the purchase of a firearms simulator, said Jane Struder, town finance director. The purchase was never made. The money was returned to Epstein on Monday, she said.¶

Staff writers Andrew Marra and Tim O’Meilia and staff researcher Angelica Cortez contributed to this story.¶

| larry_keller@pbpost.com |¶

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4B

THE PALM BEACH POST

• TUESDAY, JULY 25, 2006

Indictment: Billionaire solicited 3 times¶

The Miami-Dade Student Government Association and the ACLU said the board’s decision violated students’ constitutional right of access to information under the First Amendment.¶

BRING THIS CORPORATION¶

MIAMI — A federal judge Monday temporarily barred the Miami-Dade County School District from removing a children’s book about Cuba from school libraries and in a strongly worded opinion ordered the district¶

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Schreier, is geared toward children ages 4 to 8 and includes statements such as,¶

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Palm Beach police will report today about their prostitution probe of the money manager.¶

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Los Angeles and New York City school districts also carry the book. The Miami-Dade board overrode two committees’ and its own¶

By LARRY KELLER¶

Palm Beach Post* Staff Writer¶

School board member¶

Waterway since 1990, according to property records: A man answering the door there Monday said that Epstein wasn’t home. A Cadillac Escalade registered to him was parked in the driveway, which is flanked by two massive gargovles¶

For a New Gated Community in Western¶

Billionaire, money manager and Palm Beach part-time resident Jeffrey Epstein solicited or procured prostitutes three or more times between Aug. 1 and Oct. 31 of last year, according to an indictment charging him with felony solicitation of prostitution.¶

12 Mo.

36 Mo.

60 Mo.

Epstein sued Property Appraiser Gary Nikolits in 2001, contending that the assessment of his home exceeded its fair market value. He dismissed his lawsuit in December 2002.¶

“Generally speaking, there is a case that has a number of different aspects to it,” Edmondson said of a prostitution-related charge being submitted to a grand jury. “We first became aware of the case months ago by Palm Beach police.”¶

Epstein, 53, was booked at the Palm Beach County jail at 1:45 a.m. Sunday. He was released on $3,000 bond.¶

A profile of Epstein in Vanity Fair magazine said he owns what are believed to be the largest private homes in Manhattan — 51,000 square feet — and in New Mexico — a 7,500-acre ranch. Those are in addition to his 70-acre island in the U.S. Virgin Islands and fleet of aircraft.¶

Epstein’s case is unusual in that suspected prostitution johns are usually charged with a misdemeanor, and even a felony charge is typically made in a criminal information — an alternative to an indictment charging a person with¶

Prosecutors and police worked together to bring the case to the grand jury. he said.¶

@larry_keller@pbpost.com¶

Palm Beach police confirmed that and said the department will release a report today regarding its investigation.¶

Epstein has owned a five-bedroom, 7½-bath, 7,234-square-foot home with a pool and a boat dock on the Intracoastal¶

Epstein’s friends and admirers, according to the magazine, include prominent businessmen, academics and scientists and famed Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz.¶

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Lake Worth¶

Mystery money man faces soliciting charg¶

Jeffrey Eps Indictment related to¶

See SOLICITING, 6B ▶ prostitution¶

GARY CORONADO/Staff Photo¶

Epstein is the president of J Epstein & Co., a money management company based in Manhattan that caters to ultrawealthy clientele, according to pub-¶

Manhattan money manager Jeffrey Epstein, 53, was picked up at his home on El Brillo Way at 1:45 a.m. He was released hours later on $3,000 bond.¶

By NICOLE JANOK¶

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer¶

A part-time Palm Beacher who has socialized with Donald Trump, Bill Clinton and Kevin Spacey was jailed early Sunday with accused drug dealers, drunken drivers and wife beaters after he was charged with soliciting a prosti-¶

Epstein was indicted last week by a state grand jury, according to state attorney’s spokesman Mike Edmondson. Despite Epstein’s arrest, the indictment containing the allegations remained sealed Sunday and Edmondson provided no details.¶

convictions.¶

However, checks of court records here and in New York Sunday turned up no such convictions.¶

Unlike most accused johns, Epstein was charged with a third-degree felony instead of a misdemeanor. Under state law, a solicitation charge usually is elevated to a more serious felony when the defendant has at least two solicitation¶

Epstein could not be reached. Edmondson said he was being represented by West Palm Beach attorney Jack Goldberg, who declined comment.¶

WELLINGTON — Shadoe Stein, 17, of Palm Beach Gardens reacts to the weight of a mannequin — 130 to 165 pounds when wet — as she starts her leg of a mannequin pull relay race in the annual American Red Cross Lifeguard Competition at the Aquatics Complex. Teams from Wellington, Boca Raton and Palm Beach Gardens vied in six events on Sunday.¶

Lifesaver struggles with dead weight¶

Democratic National Chairman Howard’s speaking gig at a sold-out Wednesday in West Palm Beach is the latest coup the Democratic Professionals Forum, 10-month-old group led by Gunster dey attorney Bryan Miller that has drawn initial 2008 Democratic presidential fulls Evan Bayn and Mark Warner to¶

S. Nep: E. Gray Shaw, NY 0107¶

rdale, would turn to the next figure in residential line of succession. Shaw’s¶

ker Dennis Hastert for an Aug. 3 money¶

in Fort Lauderdale.¶

s already had President Bush and VP Beney in South Florida to headline gn fund-raisers, so it’s only natural S. Rep. E. Clay Shaw, R-Fort¶

who has become Slosberg’s chief aid for calming the ruckus that led to g’s removal from the county Health strict board. Had he been “on the” Epstein says, Slosberg might have¶

sin says Slosberg ignored his advice¶

ag peace with U.S. Rep. Robert¶

on the payroll, and you have it closest confidante who has been you right from the gitgo you throw¶

not going to work on a ion basis, period, and you should me on the payroll,” read Epstein’s Remember who got you where you u don’t want to be another Curt lo you? You have everyone else in¶

torney you beaten. As evidence;¶

torney Ted Bearden: As evidence forwarded a July 16 e-mail he¶

forwarded a July 19th notice from Epstein, who worked on s victorious 2000 campaign against¶

EFTA00188363¶

’Mysterious billionaire’ has been on probation¶

He has been in trouble before. In 1993, he and two other defendants were charged in federal court with three counts of postal larceny and theft and one count of property theft. Epstein plead guilty to a single charge of conspiring to steal U.S. Treasury checks from residential mailboxes and received 5 years’ probation. The remaining charges were¶

lished reports. National magazines have described him as a “mysterious billionaire” who lives in a 45,000-square-foot New York City mansion.¶

Staff Researcher Angelica¶

Cortez contributed to this story.¶

▶ SOLICITING from 1B¶

dropped.¶

Since then, Epstein’s name has turned up in New York City’s tabloids. The New York Post noted he flew President Clinton and Kevin Spacey to Africa on his private Boeing 727. In 2003, the paper dubbed him one of the Big Apple’s “top studs.”¶

In 2004, Epstein bid against Trump for a 43,000-square foot Palm Beach estate once owned by healthcare magnate Abe Gosman. Trump topped Epstein with a $41.35 million bid.¶

@ nicole_janok@pbpost.com¶

FHP: Injured boy properly restrained when SUV hit¶

“People were coming up over that hill and there’s a wet road and it’s boom, boom, boom. A chain reaction,” said Lt. Tim Frith, an FHP spokesman.¶

CRASH from 1B¶

for hours as I-95 was intermittently closed so damaged vehicles could be removed and the road cleaned up.¶

Frith said the boy, who was flown by helicopter to St. Mary’s, was properly restrained in the back seat of a car hit by the SUV believed to be the initial cause of the crashes. There were no reports of life-threatening injuries, Frith said.¶

FHP had cleared the interstate by 4:50 p.m., but drivers experienced backups¶

View instant reports and I-95 camera images. Check out Chuck McGinness’ blog, The Cone Zone.¶

Traffic watch¶

PalmBeachPost.com/traffic¶

Investigators are still gathering details of the accidents and charges are pending, Frith said.¶

“It’s going to take them a little while to sort this one out,” Frith said.¶

kimberly_miller@pbpost.com¶

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He was over 50. And they were girls¶

If the women whom Palm Beach police say a part-time town resident invited to his home and paid for sex acts were, in fact, women, the solicitation charge against Jeffrey Epstein might feel more sufficient. But, according to police records, they weren’t. He was over 50. And they were girls.¶

Ellsa Cramer¶

17-year-old girls.¶

That should count for something — the difference between prostitution and pedophilia.¶

So, it is baffling¶

that Mr. Epstein, who was indicted last month by a grand jury on one felony count of solicitation of prostitution, has not been charged, as Palm Beach police strenuously urged, with unlawful sex acts with a minor and lewd and lascivious molestation.¶

Conviction of crimes against minors would mean steeper penalties than the maximum five-year prison term Mr. Epstein faces if convicted of the single count of felony solicitation. It also would help carry a message of intolerance to perverts who prey on girls.¶

Prosecutors did not pursue charges against Mr. Epstein reflecting the age of the victims because they assumed a jury would view the girls not as victims but as promiscuous, untrustworthy, willing participants. The presumption is offensive.¶

Mr. Epstein, a 53-year-old Manhattan money manager who has hired Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz and defense attorney Jack Goldberger, has denied knowing how old the girls were.¶

Jury should have decided if Epstein is a pedophile.¶

But police interviews with five alleged victims and 17 witnesses under oath, as well as phone messages, a high school transcript and other items that police found from searching Mr. Epstein’s trash and 7,234-square-foot waterfront home, provide evidence that he knew the girls were teenagers.¶

One girl couldn’t show up when Mr. Epstein wanted because she had soccer. Another time, Mr. Epstein had to wait for his “massage” session because the girl he wanted was still in class.¶

Why didn’t State Attorney Barry Krischer let a jury decide whether to believe the teenagers — including a 16-year-old who went to Mr. Epstein’s house to “work” in December 2004 after being asked whether she needed to make money for Christmas gifts?¶

Prosecutors gave greater weight to the details Mr. Dershowitz provided about the girls in an apparent effort to assail their character. Mr. Dershowitz pointed out to prosecutors that some of the teenagers had talked on myspace.com about marijuana and alcohol use.¶

The 20-year-old Royal Palm Beach woman who told police she recruited girls for Mr. Epstein has a Web page on myspace.com that features one girl using the name “Pimpin’ Made EZ.”¶

Although no charges of witness tampering have been filed, the parents of at least one of the teenage victims complained to police of being followed and intimidated by two men. Police determined that their¶

vehicles were registered to two private investigators. Mr. Goldberger denied knowing anything about it.¶

Police also note in their reports that the state attorney’s office offered Mr. Epstein a plea deal that would have placed him on probation for five years, allowing him ultimately to walk away with no criminal record at all.¶

I asked Mr. Krischer’s spokesman, Mike Edmondson, why the case was referred to a grand jury instead of Mr. Epstein being charged and facing a trial before a jury. And shouldn’t the victims’ credibility be a factor to determine whether a crime’s been committed, not whether a jury will convict? (After all, as Mr. Goldberger told The Palm Beach Post of Mr. Epstein, “He’s never denied girls came to the house.”)¶

Especially, I asked Mr. Edmondson to explain: Why shouldn’t the public look at this case and think there are two kinds of justice — one for the wealthy and one for the rest of us?¶

Mr. Edmondson said he could not comment on the case because it is active, but on the latter point, he offered, for the sake of “philosophical debate”: “Whether wealth buys a different standard of justice across the country … the answer to that would, of course, be yes.”¶

But in this case, he said, “regardless of the battery of attorneys, the outcome would be the same. Every issue that was debated in public was debated in our office before this case went to the grand jury.”¶

In this case, it is not the victims’ credibility but the state attorney’s that deserves questioning.¶

Elisa Cramer is an editorial writer for The Palm Beach Post. Her e-mail address is elisa_cramer@pbpost.com¶

David Ignatius¶

Turning disaster to opportunity¶

Groping for a way to understand the ruinous mess in the Middle East, I find myself looking backward to an earlier ruinous mess, the Yom Kippur War of October 1973.¶

That long-ago war, like the current one in Lebanon, began with an Arab sneak attack — a potentially devastating Egyptian thrust across the Suez Canal, cruelly launched on Israel’s holiest day. The Israelis¶

long past when Arab fighters would see the advancing Israeli army, discard their boots and flee in terror.¶

The strategy of Israel’s (and America’s) enemies today is to lure the military superpower into a protracted conflict. To accept the bait, as the Israelis did in assaulting Lebanon and as America did in Iraq, is to risk stepping into a trap. As Lawrence Wright says in his new book:¶