Jeffrey Epstein was awaiting trial a month after being charged with sexual assault on minors. He was found hanged in his cell.
The financier and figure of the American jet set Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide Saturday 10th August 2019 in his cell in New York , where he was waiting for his trial a month after being charged with sexual assault on minors.
According to the New York Times, which quotes officials on condition of anonymity, the 66-year-old financier, whose alleged crimes had been on the news headlines almost every day since early July, hanged himself in his cell and lifeless body was found Saturday morning around 7.30am.
The office of the medical examiner confirmed his death, without specifying the cause.
The New York Post said his body was transported to a hospital near the prison, the Metropolitan Correctional Center, after a call for cardiac arrest at 6:30am.
In late July, Jeffrey Epstein was found lying on the floor, wounded, in his cell, with marks on his neck, a few days after the decision of a federal judge to keep him in detention.
Several sources said he had attempted suicide, even though his wounds were minor. He had appeared in the following days at a court hearing.
Mr Epstein was accused of organizing for several years a network of dozens of girls under his control, some college girls, with whom he had sex in his many properties, including Manhattan and Florida.
Dozens of young girls recruited
The testimonies that emerged through court documents and the American media portrayed this brilliant and rich financier the image of an insatiable predator of young girls, whom he recruited by the dozens and come to his sumptuous residences.
Although his name was already on the sex offender file after a very mild first conviction in Florida in 2007, a search conducted in early July in his upscale Upper East Side home in Manhattan revealed a massage room. intact, where his alleged victims were trained.
According to several testimonies, servants, secretaries and recruiters managed to the millimetre a dark schedule, with appointments, transport, sometimes even in private jet, instructions and compensation, often 200 to 300 dollars per visit, even gifts.
Hundreds of pages of court documents released Friday confirmed that he had long been a prominent member of the jet-set, close to many politicians, including Presidents Bill Clinton and Donald Trump.
All had claimed after his conviction that they had not been aware of his alleged crimes and had no longer any relationship with him for a long time.
Indicted on the 8th July for the sexual exploitation of minors and criminal conspiracy to sexually exploit minors, he was liable to 45 years’ imprisonment. His trial was to open at best in June 2020.
The financier, whose fortune is estimated at more than $ 500 million, was dismissed on July 18th from a bail application.
Generally used for litigants awaiting trial, the Metropolitan Correctional Center is considered one of the safest institutions in the United States.
The Mexican drug liner Joaquin Guzman, aka “El Chapo”, stayed there for more than two years.
Some media reported that he was placed under surveillance after his injury in late July, but this information has not been officially confirmed.
