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US House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) on Oct. 8 sent letters to four major banks demanding records related to more than $1.5 billion in “suspicious” financial transactions tied to Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking ring, Jessica Corbett noted at Common Dreams (10/9).
“Can Bank of America help Congress understand how Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and their co-conspirators were able to use your bank and others to conduct more than $1.5 billion in suspicious financial transactions to operate their international sex trafficking ring for years without ever being caught?” Raskin (D-Md.) wrote to the bank’s CEO, Brian Moynihan.
The congressman began his letters to Bank of New York Mellon CEO Robin Vince, Deutsche Bank CEO Christian Sewing, and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon the same way.
Epstein, a financier and convicted sex offender, was found dead in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019 while facing federal charges for sex trafficking. His death was ruled a suicide, but that has been met with deep skepticism. Maxwell is currently serving a 20-year federal sentence for her related crimes.
The US Department of Justice has refused to release all of its files on Epstein, heightening public, media, and congressional attention on his friendship with President Donald Trump in the 1990s until their alleged falling out in the early 2000s.
“In September, at a hearing with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Kash Patel, it became clear that the FBI has failed to ‘follow the money’ with regard to more than $1.5 billion in suspicious transactions related to Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking ring,” Raskin wrote Oct. 8.
“In light of this startling information, House Judiciary Committee Democrats moved to subpoena financial records related to Jeffrey Epstein from these four banks, but Republicans, with the exception of Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky,), blocked these efforts,” he explained, urging the institutions to willingly work with the panel.
Under the Bank Secrecy Act, institutions must implement anti-money laundering policies, which include requiring compliance officers, often in consultation with executives, to file a suspicious activity report (SAR) within 60 days of noticing an activity that raises a red flag, “so federal authorities can be alerted to the potential criminal activity and investigate,” the letters stress.
“Despite the public nature of Mr. Epstein’s crimes, and the hundreds of millions of his funds flowing through your bank, it appears Bank of America filed only two significantly delayed SARs relating to his conduct—covering $170 million in transactions between Mr. Epstein and billionaire investor Leon Black,” Raskin wrote to Moynihan.
