Washington DC (US) [US], January 31 (HBTV): The US Department of Justice on Friday released a major tranche of investigative material linked to late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, making public more than three million pages of records along with over 2,000 videos and around 180,000 images.
Announcing the disclosure at a news conference, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the release fulfilled a transparency mandate passed by Congress last year. ‘Today’s release marks the end of a very comprehensive document identification and review process to ensure transparency to the American people and compliance with the act,’ Blanche said.
The move follows criticism over delays and redactions in earlier disclosures. According to Al Jazeera, the administration of former US President Donald Trump has faced scrutiny over the pace of the releases and the extent of information blacked out, amid renewed attention on Trump’s past association with Epstein.
Rejecting claims that influential figures were being protected, Blanche said, ‘There’s this built-in assumption that somehow there’s this hidden tranche of information of men that we know about, that we’re covering up, or that we’re choosing not to prosecute. That is not the case.’ Trump has acknowledged a long-standing friendship with Epstein but has denied knowledge of the underage sex-trafficking network prosecutors say Epstein operated.
The Justice Department had initially missed a December 19 congressional deadline to publish the full cache. The disclosures stem from the Epstein Files Transparency Act, adopted with bipartisan backing in November, which compels the release of all federal records tied to Epstein, Al Jazeera reported.
Officials said hundreds of lawyers were assigned to review the files to determine necessary redactions to protect victims’ identities and ongoing investigations. Blanche said all women referenced in the files, apart from Ghislaine Maxwell, have been obscured in the videos and images released. Maxwell, Epstein’s former associate, was convicted of child sex trafficking and is serving a 20-year prison sentence.
Some victims have criticised the scope of the redactions, arguing that documents previously in the public domain were among those blacked out. An earlier batch of records released in December fell short of full disclosure but included flight logs indicating Trump had travelled on Epstein’s private jet in the 1990s, Al Jazeera reported.
The latest materials also include images showing figures such as Bill Gates, Steve Bannon, Woody Allen and former US President Bill Clinton socialising with Epstein. None of those depicted have been charged in connection with the case.
Epstein died by apparent suicide in a New York jail cell in August 2019, a month after being indicted on federal sex trafficking charges. One of his victims, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who accused Epstein of arranging sexual encounters with powerful men while she was underage, died in April 2025 in Australia. Those she named denied wrongdoing. (ANI)