Prosecutor portrayed Epstein’s victims as prostitutes, grand jury records show

MIAMI — A Palm Beach County prosecutor portrayed two girls abused by Jeffrey Epstein as prostitutes, drug addicts, thieves and liars to a grand jury convened in 2006 to hear the criminal case against sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

Palm Beach County Judge Luis Delgado released the controversial grand jury transcripts Monday after years of legal action by the Palm Beach Post and other media outlets, including the Miami Herald, CNN and The New York Times. Grand jury transcripts are typically kept secret to protect the integrity of the case as well as witnesses. But in the years since Epstein’s case was closed in 2008, evidence has emerged suggesting that Epstein and his team of high-priced lawyers may have used political influence to tarnish the state’s case.

The files have remained sealed for 16 years. Earlier this year, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed an order to make the files available by July 1, noting that unsealing them could explain how the wealthy Epstein was able to “come up with an outcome that the average citizen probably never could” accomplish.

The file runs to nearly 200 pages, including statements from two girls molested by Epstein, a New York financier who molested hundreds of underage girls at his Palm Beach mansion between 1996 and 2008. Epstein avoided serious charges in part because then-Palm Beach District Attorney Barry Krischer preferred to charge him with petty prostitution and solicitation of prostitution rather than prosecute him for sexual assault.

Both Krischer and the lead prosecutor in the case, Lanna Belohlavek, told Palm Beach police they did not intend to prosecute Epstein because they believed the girls were prostitutes. However, Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter and lead detective Joe Recarey filed a protest against that decision, noting that the victims were only 14 years old and that Epstein, who was in his 50s, used fraud and coercion to lure the girls to his home under the pretense that they would be paid to give him massages.

The transcripts released Monday were transcripts of audio recordings of testimony given before a grand jury convened in 2006. Although grand juries are typically convened in murder cases, Krischer took the unusual step of presenting the case to a grand jury because he did not want to allow Palm Beach police to arrest and charge the powerful and politically connected Epstein.

The actual audio recordings of the proceedings were not made available to the public Monday. The Miami Herald requested the recordings but was told they were not available. The transcripts also appear to be missing key elements that would normally be part of the grand jury proceedings. For example, there is no record of Belohlavek introducing herself to the panel, explaining what the case was about or telling the jury what to do. There is no closing statement summarizing the case and no documentation of what the grand jury ultimately decided.

What is clear is that Belohlavek painted an unsympathetic portrait of the girls, who came from broken homes. One of the girls and her sister were passed between parents and sent to a school for troubled youth. The girl ran away several times before meeting a group of older children, one of whom brought her to Epstein’s residence.

She described to the jury how she was led into a large bedroom and told to strip down to her underwear. Alone in the room with Epstein and confused about what was happening, she reluctantly agreed. After he molested her, he gave her $200.

“Do you realize that you have committed a crime?” Belohlavek asked the girl, who was 14 when she met Epstein.

“I am now. I didn’t know it was a crime when I did it,” the girl said. “Like, I — I don’t know. I guess it was prostitution or something.”

Belohlavek also allowed jurors to question the victims, some of whom expressed disapproval of their actions.

“Did you know deep down that what you were doing was wrong?” one juror asked.

“Yes, I did,” the girl replied.

“And you?” the juror asked, pointing out that the girl should have known it would damage her “reputation.”

Another juror asked: “Did it ever occur to you that he could have cut you?”

“Yes,” she stammered. “I’ve thought about it a lot.”

The juror said, “(You should) think about this for a while.”

David Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor, was stunned by the way the case was presented to the jury.

“How is that not statutory rape?” he said of Epstein’s crime. “I understand people thinking that a wealthy and powerful man could get away with abusing all those girls.”

Palm Beach Detective Joe Recarey — the lead investigator in the case — testified in detail about how Epstein and his assistants recruited girls from local high schools, initially telling them they were being hired to give him massages. Although they were told to lie about their ages, many of the girls told Epstein their real ages and talked to them about high school.

Recarey, who died in 2018, told the Herald before his death that he was frustrated with the way the district attorney handled the case, saying Krischer and Belohlavek went to great lengths to discredit the girls — and failed to present evidence to the jury that corroborated the girls’ statements, including phone records.

Neither Krischer nor Belohlavek has commented on the matter. The Miami Herald was unable to reach them Monday. Both are now retired.

Epstein’s case came under new scrutiny in 2018 — 10 years later — after a series of Miami Herald articles described secret negotiations that led Alex Acosta, the federal prosecutor who later oversaw the federal investigation, to approve a lenient prison sentence for Epstein. Epstein would serve just 13 months in Palm Beach County Jail, where he was given liberal work privileges in an office and at a Palm Beach residence. After being released, he continued to assault and abuse women at his homes in New York, New Mexico, Paris and on his isolated island off the coast of St. Thomas.

The Herald series prompted the FBI and the U.S. attorney in New York to revisit the case. He was arrested again in 2019 on sex trafficking charges and jailed in Manhattan to await trial. He was found dead in his cell a month after his arrest. His death was ruled a suicide by hanging. He was 66.

His accomplice, 63-year-old Ghislaine Maxwell, was subsequently charged in the case and convicted of sex trafficking in 2020. Maxwell, a British celebrity who had a long relationship with Epstein, is appealing the conviction.

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