The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is redacting the name of US leader Donald Trump and other prominent figures from documents in the case of financier Jeffrey Epstein, who is accused of prostitution with minors, Bloomberg agency reported, citing its sources.
According to their information, the documents were redacted when the FBI was preparing them for possible publication. Because Trump and some other people mentioned in the documents were private persons at the time the federal investigation into Epstein began in 2006, it was decided to hide their names. The FBI and the Justice Department later determined that releasing the documents would not be "appropriate and warranted." The agency stressed that the documents' mentions cannot be considered evidence of the financier's involvement in criminal activity. On July 6, the Axios news outlet reported that the Justice Department and the FBI had found no evidence of Epstein's alleged blackmail of influential figures, the existence of a client list, or any corroboration of the theory that he was murdered. White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt said that the client list that US Attorney General Pam Bondi had previously mentioned did not exist. The minister then provided additional clarifications, which in fact implied that she had expressed herself inaccurately, that she had meant all the documents in the Epstein case, but had not confirmed the existence of a list of his clients.
Trump and his team have repeatedly promised to declassify the documents from the Epstein investigation and ensure maximum transparency during the 2024 election campaign.
Epstein was detained by New York state law enforcement on July 6, 2019. The prosecutor's office said that there was evidence that he received dozens of underage girls, the youngest of whom was 14 years old, at his home in Manhattan between 2002 and 2005. Epstein's circle of friends and acquaintances included a large number of current and former employees not only in the United States but also in many other countries, including former heads of state, major entrepreneurs, and show business stars.
The criminal prosecution of the financier in the United States was discontinued after his suicide in a prison cell on August 10, 2019.