NEW YORK (AP) — Manhattan’s top federal prosecutor said Friday that a judge does not have the authority to appoint a neutral expert to oversee the public release of documents in the sex-trafficking investigation of financier Jeffrey Epstein and British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell.
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton told Judge Paul A. Engelmeier in a letter signed by U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton that he must reject a request earlier this week from congressional co-sponsors of the Epstein Documents Transparency Act to appoint a neutral expert.
U.S. Reps. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Thomas Massie, R-Kentucky, said they were “urgent and gravely concerned” about the slow release of just a few million documents that began last month.
In documents submitted to the judge, they said they believe “criminal violations occurred” during the release process.
Clayton, however, said Khanna and Massie did not have standing in court that would have allowed them to seek the “extraordinary” relief of appointing a special master and independent monitor.
He said Engelmeyer “lacked the authority” to approve such a request, especially since the congressional representative who made the request was not a party to the criminal case that resulted in Maxwell’s December 2021 sex trafficking conviction and subsequent 20-year prison sentence for recruiting girls and women for Epstein’s abuse and facilitating the abuse.
Epstein died in August 2019 in a federal prison in New York City while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. The death was ruled a suicide.
Clayton said in the letter that the Justice Department expects to update the court again “soon” on the progress of turning over documents from the Epstein and Maxwell investigations.
The Justice Department said the release of the documents had been slowed by redactions needed to protect the identities of abuse victims.
Khanna and Massey wrote in their letter that the Justice Department released only 12,000 of the more than 2 million documents it reviewed, “blatantly violating” the law’s disclosure requirements and causing “severe trauma to survivors.”
“Simply put, the Department of Justice cannot be trusted to make mandatory disclosures under this bill,” the congressman said in calling for the appointment of an independent monitor to ensure that all documents and electronically stored information are immediately made public.
They also recommended empowering court-appointed monitors to prepare reports on the true nature and scope of document production and whether inappropriate editing or conduct occurred.
