The following email was sent today to the MIT community by President L. Rafael Reif. Read the rest

David Folkenflik of NPR News has a report today about how Jeffrey Epstein terrorized members of the press who sought to report on his activity, alternating between attempting to intimidate or buy off the media. One significant episode involved Vanity Fair, under former editor in chief Graydon Carter (pictured here).

The sexual predator and accused global sex trafficker's methods included a severed cat's head, and a bullet on a doorstep. Read the rest

No surprises in Jeffrey Epstein's social media accounts. Read the rest

And check out the book she was reading.

44-year-old actress Emmy Tayler lives in Oxford, UK

Ken "Popehat" White (previously) has expanded on his excellent Twitter thread about Jeffrey Epstein's suicide in jail, and just how (shamefully) normal it is for prisoners to die in custody due to indifference, overwork, malfeasance and sadism on the part of prison authorities. Read the rest

Jeffrey Epstein is dead.

The convicted sexual predator committed suicide overnight at MCC Manhattan, the federal lockup where he had been held pending trial on federal sex trafficking charges, law enforcement officials told ABC News.

He was on “suicide watch,” but the MCC jail failed, twice, to prevent attempts of suicide. The second time, his attempt to escape justice through death worked.

The Miami Herald has confirmed that accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein has committed suicide in jail in Manhattan. Story to come. @MiamiHerald

— julie k. brown (@jkbjournalist) August 10, 2019

From ABC News:

Billionaire financier Jeffrey Epstein has died by suicide in his Manhattan jail early Saturday morning, three law enforcement officials told ABC News.

He was being held without bail at the Metropolitan Correctional Center awaiting trial on charges of conspiracy and sex trafficking. He pleaded not guilty to the charges, and a judge said he wouldn't face trial before June 2020.

He's accused of arranging to have sex with girls as young as age 14 in the early 2000s at Epstein's residences in Manhattan and Florida.

The 66-year-old was also hospitalized in July after he was found unresponsive in what appeared to be a possible suicide attempt.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Alison Moe urged a June trial date, saying there is "a public interest in bringing this case to trial as swiftly as possible." But Epstein's lawyer, Martin Weinberg, said the case is far from "ordinary," adding the defense team won't be ready before Labor Day 2020.

Read the rest

Court documents unsealed in New York on Friday provide the first detailed look at how Jeffrey Epstein operated what appears to be a vast global sex trafficking racket with the help of alleged madam Ghislaine Maxwell, “and a number of other powerful business and world leaders,” reports the Miami Herald. Read the rest

One of the enduring mysteries of the super-wealthy pedophile Jeffrey Epstein is where, exactly, he got his money: a former math teacher, he styled himself a personal financial manager catering exclusively to billionaires, but had few-to-no clients, and did not own or trade assets that anyone could locate. Read the rest

Accountability time.

Prosecutors accuse Epstein of coercing under-18 girls into sexual abuse, and paying victims to recruit others

After Alex Acosta helped Jeffrey Epstein get off the hook in Florida for “soliciting prostitution from a minor,” Epstein is reported to have received a number of odd visits while in detention -- from young women and from powerful men.

One of the men was “James E. Staley, a top JPMorgan Chase executive and one of the highest-ranking figures on Wall Street,” reports the New York Times. Read the rest

On Friday, the Palm Beach sheriff opened an internal affairs investigation into the absurdly lenient handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case, after Epstein entered a guilty plea in his prostitution case. Read the rest

A judge has ruled that convicted sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein will stay in detention pending his trial. Read the rest

Government prosecutors just revealed new details about that super suspicious passport —- his photo, different name -- Jeffrey Epstein kept hidden in a safe.. Read the rest

Trump Labor Secretary under fire for his previous handling of Jeffrey Epstein case in Florida

In a characteristically brilliant essay, historian, activist and writer Rebecca Solnit connects the dots between the sexual abuses of Jeffrey Epstein, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Brett Kavanaugh, Harvey Weinstein, and the unnamed 16-year-old boy whose admitted rape was excused because the judge said that This young man comes from a good family who put him into an excellent school where he was doing extremely well: in each case, there was an elaborate scheme to silence and discredit the survivors of sexual violence, abetted by networks of (mostly) men who treat the disclosure of sexual assaults as a worse offense than committing the assaults themselves. Read the rest