🔗 Share this article

Investigative Body

The House Oversight Committee has released a set of around 70 photos obtained from the property of deceased convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

This constitutes the third release from a larger collection of in excess of 95,000 photographs the body has secured from Epstein's estate. It contains photographs of quotes from the novel Lolita inscribed across a female's body, and obscured pictures of women's foreign passports.

This disclosure comes hours before the 19th of December due date for the Justice Department to make public each documents related to its probe into Epstein.

"These photographs raise further questions about precisely what the DOJ has in its custody," stated the Democratic lead of the committee, Robert Garcia.

What's in the Photographs Made Public

A number of the images released on Thursday depict Epstein conversing with professor and activist Noam Chomsky inside a personal aircraft; Bill Gates seen beside a woman whose features is obscured; Steve Bannon seated at a table opposite Epstein, and former Alphabet president Sergey Brin at a evening meal.

Committee

These are the most recent wealthy, influential men to be photographed in Epstein's estate photos released by the committee - formerly released photos also include US President Donald Trump and past president Bill Clinton, as well as director Woody Allen, previous US Secretary of the Treasury Larry Summers, lawyer Alan Dershowitz, Andrew Mountbatton-Windsor, and additional individuals.

Appearing in the photos is not proof of any misconduct, and several of the pictured figures have asserted they were in no way implicated in Epstein's criminal activity.

In a press release issued alongside the photo publication, Lawmakers on the US House Oversight Committee stated the Epstein estate's representatives did not supply background information or timeframes for the pictures.

"Photos were chosen to provide the American people with transparency into a illustrative selection of the photos received from the property, and to offer perspectives into Epstein's network and his profoundly disturbing activities," the announcement reads.

Committee

The release also features a number of images of excerpts from the Vladimir Nabokov novel Lolita inscribed in ink across several locations of a woman's body, including her upper body, feet, pelvis, and back. Lolita tells the tale of a minor who was groomed by a older literature professor.

One quote from the book inscribed across a woman's chest states, "Lolita: the tip of the tongue making a journey of three steps down the roof of the mouth to tap, at three, on the teeth".

Additionally, there are a series of photographs of female travel documents and official papers from nations worldwide, such as Lithuania, Russia, the Czech Republic, and Ukraine.

Committee

The majority of the details on the documents, such as names and birth dates, is redacted but the House Oversight Committee said in a announcement that the travel documents pertain to "individuals whom Jeffrey Epstein and his associates were involved with".

Another photo features Epstein seated at a desk closely in the company of three female figures whose features have been censored - one has her palm on Epstein's upper body under his clothing, and another is crouching to examine a close-by computer. Epstein can be seen to be aiding the third individual attach a bracelet.

Investigative Body

A further photo released is a screenshot of SMS messages from an unidentified individual who states they have been sent "a number of girls" and are requesting "$1000 for each individual".

Photo Disclosure Comes Ahead of DOJ Cut-off

The committee has a vast number of photos in its possession from the Epstein holdings, which are "simultaneously graphic and ordinary," its press release on this week explained.

The Congressional committee first subpoenaed the property of Epstein, who died in a New York prison in 2019 while facing trial on charges of human trafficking, in August.

The images and files the Epstein estate provided to the panel are separate from what is commonly referred to "the Epstein documents". Those files are papers within the DOJ's custody related to its own probe into Epstein.

Pursuant to the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which the President made law recently, the DOJ has until 19 December to disclose its documents. The full nature of what's contained in the DOJ's records is unknown, and it's probable that a large amount of the content will be heavily obscured, akin to House Oversight Committee materials