🔗 Share this article

Committee

The House investigative committee has published a collection of around 70 photos from the estate of former convicted sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein.

This represents the third disclosure from a larger collection of more than 95,000 photos the committee has obtained from Epstein's property. It features images of quotes from the literary work Lolita scrawled across a female's body, and redacted images of women's international passports.

This release comes hours before the December 19th due date for the DOJ to release every files connected to its inquiry into Epstein.

"These images raise additional queries about what exactly the DOJ has in its custody," said the senior Democrat of the committee, Robert Garcia.

What is in the Photographs Disclosed

Several of the photographs released on recently depict Epstein in discussion with professor and activist Noam Chomsky on a private plane; Bill Gates seen alongside a woman whose features is redacted; Steve Bannon sitting at a workstation across from Epstein, and ex- Alphabet president Sergey Brin at a dinner event.

Oversight Panel

These are the latest affluent, influential men to be photographed in Epstein property images disclosed by the committee - earlier published pictures also depict US President Donald Trump and ex-president Bill Clinton, as well as film director Woody Allen, ex- US Secretary of the Treasury Larry Summers, counsel Alan Dershowitz, Andrew Mountbatton-Windsor, and additional individuals.

Appearing in the photographs is not indication of any wrongdoing, and many of the pictured individuals have asserted they were never involved in Epstein's unlawful actions.

In a statement issued alongside the photograph release, Democrats on the US House Oversight Committee noted the Epstein estate did not offer background information or dates for the images.

"Photos were selected to offer the American people with transparency into a typical cross-section of the images obtained from the holdings, and to provide perspectives into Epstein's associates and his profoundly alarming behavior," the release states.

Oversight Panel

The publication also contains multiple photos of passages from the Vladimir Nabokov literary work Lolita inscribed in ink across different parts of a woman's body, such as her torso, feet, hip, and rear. Lolita recounts the tale of a minor who was manipulated by a older literature professor.

A particular excerpt from the novel written across a female's torso states, "Lo-lee-ta: the point of the tongue traveling of three steps down the palate to alight, at three, on the teeth".

Additionally, there are a series of images of women's passports and identification documents from nations around the world, such as Lithuania, Russia, the Czech Republic, and Ukraine.

Committee

A large portion of the information on the IDs, including names and dates of birth, is obscured but the House Oversight Committee said in a announcement that the passports belong to "individuals whom Jeffrey Epstein and his associates were engaging".

An additional photo shows Epstein sitting at a workstation intimately in the company of three female figures whose features have been obscured - one has her hand on Epstein's chest under his garment, and another is bending to view a nearby computer. Epstein appears to be helping the final person put on a piece of jewelry.

Committee

A further photograph disclosed is a capture of SMS messages from an unknown sender who claims they have been sent "some girls" and are asking for "$$1,000 per girl".

Photo Disclosure Arrives Ahead of DOJ Deadline

The committee has many thousands of images in its custody from the Epstein estate, which are "at once explicit and ordinary," its press release on this week explained.

The Congressional committee first issued a subpoena to the property of Epstein, who died in a New York prison in 2019 while pending legal proceedings on accusations of sex trafficking, in August.

The images and records the Epstein estate gave to the panel are different than what is commonly referred to "Epstein-related records". Those are records within the Department of Justice's custody related to its separate inquiry into Epstein.

Pursuant to the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which President Trump made law in November, the DOJ has until the date of 19 December to publish its documents. The scope of the contents included in the DOJ's files is unclear, and it's probable that much of the content will be significantly obscured, akin to the committee's materials