AP sources: Epstein jail guards had been offered plea deal

[canetoad]

Source: AP

By MICHAEL BALSAMO and MICHAEL R. SISAK November 16, 2019

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal prosecutors offered a plea deal to two correctional officers responsible for guarding Jeffrey Epstein on the night of his death, but the officers have declined the offer, people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.

The existence of the plea offer signals the Justice Department is considering criminal charges in connection with the wealthy financier’s death at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York in August. The city’s medical examiner ruled Epstein’s death a suicide.

The guards on Epstein’s unit are suspected of failing to check on him every half hour, as required, and of fabricating log entries to show they had. As part of the proposed plea deal, prosecutors wanted the guards to admit they falsified the prison records, according to the people familiar with the matter. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to publicly discuss the investigation.

The U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan had no comment on the plea offer.

Both guards were working overtime because of staffing shortages. They have been placed on administrative leave while the FBI and the Justice Department’s inspector general investigate the circumstances surrounding Epstein’s death. The 66-year-old had been awaiting trial on charges of sexually abusing teenage girls.

Read more: https://apnews.com/11ae6142bbb84af49daae80b94f1b4e2?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP

[Corgigal]

1. Make them prove it.

It shouldn’t be hard. I mean they had 2 cameras,

Oh...

[RockRaven]

2. Are they afraid that if they cooperate in any way they will be next?

(a la "Epstein did not kill himself" memes)

Or do they genuinely believe they can beat the charges of falsifying records (if, in fact, such charges were ever filed)?

[ToxMarz]

6. If Epstein did not kill himself

I'm sure someone would like a plausible explanation how he could have (ie. a coerced plea deal of wrongdoing with the guards) to muddy the waters.

Kind of like a public announcement of Ukraine President into corruption investigation of Biden. What happens after that is irrelevant they just need that obfuscation.

I would rather see the proof of wrong doing than a plea deal and nothing to corroborate it.

[aeromanKC]

3. DOJ doesn't want them to testify

HHMM???

[jberryhill]

5. Very rarely do criminal defendants testify

If you want someone to testify, you DON’T CHARGE THEM WITH A CRIME.

Because if you charge someone with a crime, that’s the best way to get them NOT to testify.

So weird how folks must think it’s common for defendants to testify. Yes it happens, but rarely.

[Codeine]

15. You learned law at an academic institution.

The rest of us learned it from from prime time television. Our understanding of procedure is predictably skewed toward the dramatic.

[jberryhill]

17. That's a good point

[exboyfil]

4. If any investigation is begging for an independent prosecutor

This is one. Find some good prosecuting attorney with no connections to this society or Washington. Someone from the midwest maybe.

[Scotch-Irish]

23. I totally agree: THIS issue is where all the tRump bodies are buried.

Get to the bottom of the Epstein/tRump/Acosta/Putin/Manafort connections, and you'll see the sun come out!

[nilram]

7. WHY a plea deal? Don't you offer that when

you want to get something back? Like, you cop to a lesser charge of X, so you can testify freely against Mr Big? I don't see what We The People would get out of a deal in this case.

[Princess Turandot]

9. Most criminal cases don't involve a Mr Big, yet thousands of plea deals are made each year.

The "Peoples' deal" is saving the time and cost of a trial. Consider the number of people in prison for lower level drug offenses. Most of them weren't tried. They were offered a deal and their attorneys convinced them to take it.

DOJ wants to blame someone for the negligence that allowed for Epstein's suicide. The guards would have been a good start, and they hoped to do so by having them admit to not checking on him etc.

[jberryhill]

18. Here, play Chutes and Ladders....

Trials are not really a common feature of the criminal justice system.

Trying and locking up a couple of guys for shirking work in a shitty job is not the best use of resources. Imagine explaining this away in their next interview for an even shittier job.

[stopdiggin]

8. I don't find this surprising at all.

Suspect an decent lawyer is telling them to sit tight.

[orleans]

10. the real question is: who killed him?

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/state/florida/article236809668.html

[usaf-vet]

12. What was this former Navy Seal saying? Epstein didn't kill himself?

https://www.newsweek.com/jeffrey-epstein-didnt-kill-himself-former-navy-seal-fox-news-1469444
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10273607/ex-navy-seal-epstein-didnt-kill-himself/

[Botany]

11. If it was a contract killing I am sure the guards were told something like "nice family & nice house

... be a shame if something happened." And then they were shown pictures of their families, homes,
cars, and what else. And if they went to the FBI their stories would get to Bill Barr who is the A.G. of
the D.o.J. and he is a fixer for the Trump crime family.

[Vinca]

13. They're perfect cases for Don the Con to pardon. Buy 'em off, shut 'em up.

[Botany]

14. Funny on the next day after Jeffery Epstein said that Trump was flying on his plane years after ...

..... he said that he had no more cantata with him and that information was coming out that
Epstein used Trump's plane to move young girls around that he wound up dead. BTW Jeff's
death one week after Bill Barr had visited the Fed. jail in NYC where Epstein was staying.

If you have a few watch the video that is posted in this thread ... tons of links to Trump and
or Trump's friends and or business partners.

[Vinca]

19. Thanks. I will. The whole thing is stinky, stinky, stinky.

[Polybius]

21. And his death also came a day after two more prominent politicians were linked to him

Who knows who else would have came out.

[Kid Berwyn]

16. They ever get the cameras fixed?

Speaking of evidence.

[Opel_Justwax]

20. It's always the cover up that will get you.

I'm talking about the falsified logs not Epstein's suicide.

[Evolve Dammit]

22. Stinks to high heaven. Highest profile prisoner, they don't check and falsified records??

Cameras broken and someone heard Epstein screaming. Murdered because of who he would implicate, and the names of his clientele are very well known. Wonder how many GOOP Christians were in there? Who paid the guards for not being present and now their silence? BTW, Prince Andrew is not looking too well in all this. Hopefully "clients" like Derschowitz are being looked into. These girls' trauma needs to be heard and their abusers exposed.