Chasing Hope for America’s Children: Advocating for the Children Sexually Abused by Jeffery Epstein (A Conversation with Paul Cassell)

Everyone has now heard about the horrific sex crimes Jeffrey Epstein committed against countless girls and young women for decades through his sex trafficking organization. What many people do not know is that the Epstein survivors’ courageous fight to pursue justice and assert their rights changed the legal landscape for victims and survivors across the nation, and that their positive impact continues to be felt today. 

Listen to our latest episode of Radio Kempe to hear a firsthand account from attorney Paul Cassell about the determination of the Epstein survivors and their attorneys to ensure that no other children have to endure what they endured at the hands of America’s justice system.

Read more about Paul Cassell here: https://profiles.faculty.utah.edu/u0031056. If you would like to learn more about this decade-long legal battle, you can check out the book by his co-counsel, Bradley Edwards, at https://tinyurl.com/57ek24w4.

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:19:15
Unknown
You're listening to Radio Kempe. We value the sense of community that connects people and helps them find ways to move forward. Join us on our journey to prevent child abuse and neglect.

00:00:19:15 - 00:01:01:02
Unknown
Welcome and welcome back. This is radio Kempe. I'm Warren Binford with the Kempe Center for the Prevention and Treatment of Child Abuse and Neglect at the University of Colorado. Thank you to our listeners for joining us for the third episode in our newest series, chasing Hope for America's Children. Today we will be interviewing Professor Paul Kassel. Professor Cassell is an internationally recognized expert on victim and survivor, writes Paul represented a number of victims in the first Jeffery Epstein case in the early 2000, and he used that painful event to help advance victim rights in the United States.

00:01:01:04 - 00:01:27:19
Unknown
Professor Cassell serves as a Ronald and Boyce Professor of Criminal Law at the University of Utah College of Law. Welcome, Paul, and thank you so much for joining us today. Thanks for having me more. Paul, can you tell us a little bit about your journey? How did you first become interested in victim rights? Well, I've been, a lawyer now for, gosh, a couple of decades.

00:01:27:19 - 00:01:52:12
Unknown
And I remember right after I graduated from law school, I clerked for several years. And as a result, I watched, not only civil cases being adjudicated by the judge, but, criminal cases as well. And it struck me, as I was going through those cases, observing those cases, that we have a system that has prosecutors to represent the people of the state.

00:01:52:14 - 00:02:15:12
Unknown
We have defense attorneys to represent the defendant, but there are third parties in criminal proceedings that have very important interests at stake. But there's nobody who really speaks for their interests, nobody who helps them navigate the system. And so over the last several decades, I was a prosecutor for a while, a law professor. I was a federal judge for five years out here in Utah.

00:02:15:12 - 00:02:38:12
Unknown
But I resigned my position to go back. To teaching at the University of Utah College of Law with a focus on crime victims rights, to try to figure out how can we protect the interests of third parties in criminal justice proceedings. And so I've been, lecturing, in those areas, writing in those areas. And I think we're going to be talking about today.

00:02:38:13 - 00:03:09:11
Unknown
I also do a lot of pro-bono litigation trying to protect crime victims rights in the criminal justice process and make sure that what is conventionally been a two party system of justice, that the state and the defendant now becomes more of a three party system where, victims are heard. So, Paul, help me to understand. So you keep referring to third parties, and it seems like you're referring to victims of those crimes.

00:03:09:11 - 00:03:36:15
Unknown
How are they? A third party in this case, isn't the D.A. the prosecutor representing them? Well, that's a great question. And I'm probably speaking like, a lawyer, because when we think about adversarial processes, we think about, all right, what is the case caption. And so, you might see state versus Smith, the state, in whatever state the prosecutor lives, pursuing a defendant, you know, Mr..

00:03:36:15 - 00:04:05:02
Unknown
Or Mrs. Smith. And at that point, what you have is the state being represented by the prosecutor who speaks on behalf of the people. But you might say, well, isn't what isn't one of the persons then the the crime victim? But in the eyes of the law, the answer to that question is no. The district attorney, the prosecutor is speaking for the broader public interest and isn't, actually litigating on behalf of the victim.

00:04:05:04 - 00:04:26:17
Unknown
Now, to be clear, a lot of times the prosecutor will be taking the kind of position that the victim might think is appropriate. The prosecutor might be trying to move criminal charges forward or, imprisoned and defended for a crime that was committed against the victim. But there may be situations where the victim, wants something different than the prosecutor.

00:04:26:19 - 00:04:47:22
Unknown
For example, it might be that the prosecutor is moving to dismiss criminal charges, and maybe the victim is opposed to that. Or there can even be cases where the victim might say, look, I really don't want to be caught up in this criminal justice process. I'd like the charges to be dropped, but the prosecutor might say, well, the public interest requires this case to go forward.

00:04:47:24 - 00:05:13:02
Unknown
So, in the eyes of the law, crime victims are third parties. They are not, in the case caption, the name of the case. And their interests are only indirectly protected by the prosecutor. Not directly protected, at least, in many situations. Can you talk to me about, an example of that? My my recollection is that you represented a number of victims.

00:05:13:02 - 00:05:44:22
Unknown
And the first Jeffrey Epstein case in the early 2000. Can you tell us a little bit about that case and how you became involved? Yeah. Let me talk a little bit about the factual, background there and then zero in on on your specific point about how are victims. Third parties? I think it's pretty well known that Jeffrey Epstein ran a very large sex trafficking organization, both for his own sexual gratification and for the gratification of, of others.

00:05:44:24 - 00:06:10:08
Unknown
And many of the victims of that sex trafficking were, juveniles. They were women under the age or I should say, girls, to be more precise, under the age of 18. And this was kind of a notorious, operation, and it seemed to be generally fairly well known down in Florida. But ultimately, law enforcement, moved in state law enforcement, and they started pursuing charges.

00:06:10:10 - 00:06:42:24
Unknown
And the U.S. attorney actually in the area, the federal prosecutor also started pursuing federal sex trafficking charges. And so Epstein was very wealthy. He had a lot of political connections. Had, the ability, I think it's fair to say, to probably obtain special treatment in the system that would not have been available to others. Then he reached a plea deal where he had to, I think he was 100, where he, he went to, to jail at night.

00:06:42:24 - 00:07:05:12
Unknown
And then he was on quote unquote, work release every day. Where, you know, went into his fancy office building and shuffled some papers around. So, for running a major sex trafficking ring, it really was not an appropriate disposition. Epstein also obtained, essentially immunity for, all the others who were involved in the organization as well.

00:07:05:12 - 00:07:42:08
Unknown
So it was really quite a remarkable and and remarkably lenient, deal. Now, where did the third parties come in then? Where did the crime victims come in? The prosecutors, particularly the federal prosecutor, reached this plea deal without consulting with the victims. The women and girls who had been trafficked were not told about the plea deal. The deal was kind of, orchestrated and rushed through and approved by the by the court before anyone had a chance to comment on it and try to convince the judge not to accept such a generous, deal.

00:07:42:10 - 00:08:09:05
Unknown
So, along with, a colleague of mine, Brad Edwards, who's a very capable crime, victims rights lawyer. Brad and I teamed up in 2008 to challenge that plea deal. And our, our legal basis for challenging the deal was what's known as the Crime Victims Rights Act. Or I'll refer to it as the Cobra. It's a federal law that was enacted back in 2002.

00:08:09:07 - 00:08:32:19
Unknown
And it says in the federal criminal justice system, victims have certain rights. They have the right to be notified of court hearings. They have the right to attend those hearings, and they have the right to speak at certain hearings, such as the bail hearing or a plea bargain hearing or a sentencing hearing. And they also have a general right to confer with the prosecutor handling the case.

00:08:32:21 - 00:08:55:16
Unknown
And so, as you can see from the description that I've just given about how the Epstein case unfolded, the victims were not given their right to confer with the prosecutors. The prosecutors cut this plea deal without talking to anyone. And so we went into court to argue the plea deal should be thrown out. Because of that violation of crime, victims rights.

00:08:55:18 - 00:09:24:19
Unknown
So how many victims were there in that first case? So Brad and I initially represented, basically two of the girls who had been sex trafficked. They'd been in traffic trafficked, extensively by Epstein, but we were, roughly, representing a much larger group of victims because they were all similarly situated. Accounts vary on how many victims Epstein actually had.

00:09:24:19 - 00:09:48:13
Unknown
I think, you know, you're probably looking at at least 80 girls and women, maybe more than 100, depending on the time frame that you look at. But the number was substantial. And the argument was that the prosecutors had made no effort whatsoever to contact, any of the victims families, or the victims or their families to tell them what was going on.

00:09:48:15 - 00:10:15:03
Unknown
In fact, one of our our most critical pieces of evidence was a communication that the prosecutors had sent to victims. They said, well, we realize you're interested in this case. Please be patient. We'll get back in touch with you. If there's going to be any developments in this case. And they were essentially, I would say, lulling the victims to sleep and suggesting that nothing was happening.

00:10:15:05 - 00:10:38:14
Unknown
And while they were sending those, letters out to the victims, they were notified they were, negotiating with Epstein's very high powered legal team to cut this. A lot of people have called it a sweetheart plea deal, a very generous plea deal. And the victims were essentially cut out of that process entirely. And about how many of these 80 to 100 victims were children?

00:10:38:16 - 00:11:01:02
Unknown
Well, I think most of them were trafficked, by Epstein when they were, under the age of 18. There many of them were of high school age. So sometimes they were they would have been slightly, above the age or slightly above the age of 17. But Epstein had a sexual interest in an underage, girls.

00:11:01:02 - 00:11:27:04
Unknown
And so that's why the the victims were of that, in that age range. And, and you talked about both state and federal prosecutors being involved in, in this case. So how how did that work? Who actually made the sweetheart deal with him? Was that that did you say the federal prosecutors who entered the plea deal? Yeah, it's an interesting question.

00:11:27:04 - 00:11:51:24
Unknown
And I know some of you listeners might wonder, well, how do we know if a crime is a federal crime or a state crime, trafficking, children for sex? Is that a federal crime or a state crime? The answer in many situations is that it's a crime under both sets of laws. And so I like to when I teach criminal law to my students, I talk about bank robbery while, well, robbing a bank.

00:11:51:24 - 00:12:22:03
Unknown
That's a crime. Robbery. In whatever state you're in. But if the bank is federally insured. Excuse me, but if the bank is federally insured, as basically all banks are, then robbery from the bank also becomes a federal crime. There's a federal jurisdictional hook. And so it is with sex trafficking. Trafficking girls for sex violates the laws in this case of the state of Florida.

00:12:22:05 - 00:12:43:23
Unknown
But it's also a federal offense, because typically when when girls are being moved for sex, they travel in what lawyers refer to as interstate commerce. That means that there is a federal interest in stamping out that crime. And so the crime can be prosecuted at either the state level or the federal level. Generally, the federal prosecutors have more resources.

00:12:44:03 - 00:13:06:09
Unknown
The penalties for federal crimes are generally tougher than they are in the state system. So in this case, it was agreed between the federal and state prosecutors that the feds, as it has, they're called the feds, would step in and take over the case. The state would no longer move forward. And then once the case was in the hands of the federal prosecutors, they negotiated this very generous plea deal.

00:13:06:11 - 00:13:30:22
Unknown
Again, it's generosity was partly towards Epstein that he didn't actually serve hard time, as they say. He had a work release set up. But more broadly, it immunized all of the coconspirators, as you can imagine, an organization, a sex trafficking organization with that many victims is not orchestrated by just one person alone. There are a vast number of people who are involved.

00:13:30:22 - 00:14:17:15
Unknown
And so, all of those people were given immunity from federal prosecution as a result of the plea deal. So when you talk about Coconspirators, you're talking about like, just laying Rex Maxwell would be a, classic, illustration of the fact that there were others involved. She was Epstein's girlfriend, and was also used. I mean, many of these sex trafficking crimes, there's someone who's involved in grooming, the victims, oftentimes, in scenarios like this one, it's often a woman, who can gain the trust of the victims and explain, or try to explain to the victims what's, what they should do to keep the the perpetrators happy.

00:14:17:15 - 00:14:43:16
Unknown
And so that's exactly what we saw here is, is, she received, immunity from the Florida State. I'm sorry, the Florida federal prosecutors. And I'll. We'll circle back to that point in in a minute when we talk about how the case ultimately came out. But the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida gave immunity not only to Epstein, but to others who were involved in the sex trafficking.

00:14:43:18 - 00:15:13:20
Unknown
Okay, so you had this, you know, this wide immunity for all of the coconspirators in the federal prosecution for, child sex trafficking. And you also said he had a sweetheart deal. Tell me a little bit about what that sweetheart deal look like. Yeah, the deal gave, Epstein a 18 month sentence, which sounds like. Well, that seems like 18 months in prison.

00:15:13:20 - 00:15:43:20
Unknown
That's pretty tough. But then. And the way it unfolded was the time was actually to be served in a local municipal facility. And the arrangement was for work released. Epstein was, financier, a banker type and so he somehow convinced the judge that he should go to his fancy office. I think, roughly speaking, 12 hours a day to work, quote unquote, on, financial affairs.

00:15:43:22 - 00:16:08:05
Unknown
And so he would just go back to the jail to sleep was all, and then he would return the next day to work. The 18 month sentence, as I recall, also was later shortened to just 12 months. So, you know, a year and a municipal jail doing work release for running an international sex trafficking organization that is not really punishment that fits the crime by any measure.

00:16:08:07 - 00:16:41:02
Unknown
And so that's why I think most people, that have looked at the case, are just unable to explain why would the prosecutor have reached, such a deal like that? It's really a case that, reeks of political connections or treating, a wealthy defendant, differently than others would be treated. Epstein had a vast array of political and financial connections that he seems to have used to convince the prosecutors, the federal prosecutors, to reach this very, very generous deal.

00:16:41:04 - 00:17:05:05
Unknown
Okay, so you've got this, you know, immunity for all his coconspirators. You have the sweetheart deal. Basically, he's staying in a, local jail for half the day. But during the day, he's able to to go to his fancy office and work all day. And then some. And then then the sentence is shortened from 18 months to a year.

00:17:05:07 - 00:17:28:15
Unknown
And in the meanwhile, the prosecutor sends out a communication to these victims, the majority of whom were kids at the time they were trafficked. And it says, hey, please be patient. And that's it. Kind of lull them into complacency. So how do you and Brad get involved? How do you guys come onto the scene? How do you hear about this?

00:17:28:17 - 00:17:50:20
Unknown
So, Brad was contacted by one of the victims, of Epstein, and she had received this loving letter. Be patient and so forth. And and Brad looked at it and, and thought they. Well, look, it seems like something is afoot here. And there were rumors going around that the case was about to be resolved in some way.

00:17:50:20 - 00:18:15:06
Unknown
So, the victim, I'll refer to her as Courtney. Courtney had not, received any notifications or any opportunities to confer about, some kind of a plea deal. So Brad decided to go to federal court there in the Southern District of Florida. And file, this was in Fort Lauderdale and file a motion saying, look, the prosecutors need to confer with, with the victim.

00:18:15:06 - 00:18:32:24
Unknown
So there's kind of an amusing story. This was back in 2008. Nowadays, there's a lot of electronic filing that's done in federal and many state courts. But back then, the filing was done in paper. So Brad, banged out a, a paper filing of 3 or 4 pages saying, look there. It seems like there's a plea deal.

00:18:33:01 - 00:19:00:23
Unknown
Prosecutors aren't, talking to anyone. So, we would like you the court, immediately order, the, prosecutors to talk to the victims. And so, what happened at that point was I'm going to the to the window, to file the case, the clerk's office there, and handed the filing in to the clerk. And she looked at it and said, well, you're asking the judge to do something immediately here, but you haven't called it an emergency motion.

00:19:01:00 - 00:19:26:10
Unknown
So, that's not going to work. So Brad said, can you give me the pleading back? Then she handed the paper back, and Brad pulled out a pen and wrote an emergency motion to have the prosecutors order. And it did back to them and says, how does that work? And if you in fact, if you go into the court file on the Epstein case today and you look at docket entry number one, you'll see a little handwritten emergency motion for for court order.

00:19:26:10 - 00:19:48:18
Unknown
So anyways, the, the, the motion was filed, but it, because of the timing of the filing and the timing of the plea deal, the prosecutors had already moved forward with with the plea deal before, Brad, Brad's, motion could be acted upon about the same time. I think it was a day or two after he file, Brad gave me a call.

00:19:48:18 - 00:20:16:22
Unknown
I do a lot of of work in the federal system protecting crime victims rights. As a former federal judge, I have a lot of experience in that area. So Brad and I teamed up and filed our briefing, and, gosh, that was back in 2008. The judge, handling the matter gave us a hearing and said, well, look, there really are a lot of factual disputes about whether the who did the prosecutors notify?

00:20:17:03 - 00:20:41:10
Unknown
What did those letters say? How were they interpreted? What did the prosecutors know? So the judge ordered, discovery, Fact-Finding on what exactly had happened. And we spent then several years, Brad and I did, trying to collect the communications from the US Attorney's office. The notifications that had been provided and, more importantly, had not been provided to to victims.

00:20:41:10 - 00:21:06:00
Unknown
And eventually, gosh, I think it took us trying to do the math in my head. I think it was around, 2018. So it was almost ten years later, after lengthy discovery and disputes over what was confidential and what could be made available to us. But but eventually, the judge handling the case ruled that the victim's rights had been violated.

00:21:06:00 - 00:21:49:05
Unknown
There had been no conferral. By the prosecutors, regarding the outcome of the case. And so the judge held that the Crime Victims Rights Act, have been violated. So what were the victims rights in that case in the early 2000? Yeah. So the Crime Victims Rights Act was in effect at the time. It was the Crime Victims Rights Act had been enacted by Congress in 2002, and one of the rights that existed was a general right to confer with prosecutors who were handling the case, and the victims had not been conferred with they were never asked, hey, what are your views about an immunity provision for all these other perpetrators?

00:21:49:05 - 00:22:16:01
Unknown
What do you think about an 18 month, work release sentence? None of that had happened. They had not been notified about, the court hearing or the plea deal was being accepted. And more broadly, there's a right under the Crime Victims Rights Act that says victims should be treated with fairness throughout the process. And this, secret plea deal by a wealthy defendant that essentially cut the victims out of the case.

00:22:16:03 - 00:22:45:14
Unknown
That was not fair. And so, for all those reasons, the judge found that, the, prosecutors, the federal prosecutors had violated the Crime Victims Rights Act, by failing to meet and confer with the victims and let them know what was going on. Okay, but that took ten years. Paul. It did I you know, when I signed up, to work with Brad, and we both handled the case, pro bono, because it was a criminal case.

00:22:45:14 - 00:23:12:20
Unknown
It wasn't for a civil case to obtain money. There were some other civil cases that were filed. But the CBRE case we're talking about, was, ten years of legal work. I think at some point, Brad and I figured that, you know, we had collectively put in several thousands of hours of pro-bono time because whenever you litigate against the federal government, as you might imagine, they have very skilled legal teams, very large legal teams.

00:23:12:22 - 00:23:38:00
Unknown
And Epstein also was in there with a large and, and, elaborate legal team. So we had first, we had a lot of, discovery motions where the prosecutors and, and Epstein would fight us about what could be made available to us. At some point, Epstein's lawyers said that there was a plea bargaining privilege, like an attorney client privilege or a doctor patient privilege or something like that.

00:23:38:00 - 00:24:01:10
Unknown
They said when we were talking about plea bargaining with the prosecutors, that should be privileged information. That seemed kind of far fetched, but they were able to, take an appeal from the trial court in Florida, to the 11th circuit, based in Atlanta, and make, argue about that. And that took, so I recall 18 months or something like that of back and forth.

00:24:01:10 - 00:24:30:17
Unknown
Eventually the court unanimously agreed that when you're, communicating with the prosecutors, that's not top-secret or privileged information. They're actually talking to an adversary in the criminal justice process. So that took quite a long time to eventually collect all the facts. I remember there was one summer where back then again, as I mentioned, I think we were doing a lot of our work, in paper, because, the legal processes, at that time were largely paper processes.

00:24:30:19 - 00:24:51:18
Unknown
So I'm trying to remember how many banker's boxes of information we had. I think it was 7 or 8. Then we put little yellow and pink tabs on them to try to highlight the different, communications that were made or were not made with the victims. And eventually we filed, I think, about 100 page motion for what lawyers call summary judgment.

00:24:51:18 - 00:25:14:03
Unknown
That is, we said, look, judge the facts. Here are so clear cut that no reasonable, jury could reach any other conclusion. Other than that the victim's rights were violated. And as I mentioned, eventually the judge handling the case, judge may are a very capable and experienced judge down in Fort Lauderdale. Federal judge agreed with us that the victim's rights had been violated.

00:25:14:05 - 00:25:22:24
Unknown
So is that the same judge who approved, sweetheart deal.

00:25:23:01 - 00:25:54:14
Unknown
Gosh, I'm trying to remember that when you remember, I think the answer to that question is no. Because I think, the plea deal was done in the state system in front of a state court judge, but the immunity provision was a federal non-prosecution agreement and NPA, as the lawyers refer to it. And the NPA was entered into between the federal prosecutors and Epstein.

00:25:54:16 - 00:26:18:10
Unknown
And so that was a secret document. Initially it wasn't disclosed to the public. And then that was part of our discovery process was to try to to get a hold of that document that, immunized the participants and, and otherwise gave, Epstein the ability to escape. Federal prosecution. Okay. So I don't think I understood this when we were originally talking.

00:26:18:12 - 00:26:57:12
Unknown
So the Coconspirators were given federal immunity, so they can't be prosecuted by the US government. But the sweetheart deal, where he was in the local jail for, you know, 12 hours a day for just a year, that was a state deal. Well, it was it was complicated. And if you're perplexed by how all this was organized, and I'm, at a distance, I'm having a little trouble recalling all of the ins and outs because Epstein was getting, the kind of arrangement that is not typically provided in our criminal justice system.

00:26:57:14 - 00:27:26:05
Unknown
I mean, typically your case will be handled by the federal government or the state government, or sometimes perhaps even both. But here there was this intermingling of a low level state guilty plea with a lower level, a state sentence and a federal non-prosecution agreement blocking federal prosecution of Epstein and his coconspirators at least blocking their prosecution. Within the Southern District of Florida.

00:27:26:07 - 00:27:55:08
Unknown
So, yeah, it was quite an unusual, deal that, Epstein's very skilled legal team helped to, to orchestrate. Okay, so now I'm learning something new, which is that this this federal immunity, it wasn't just for his coconspirators. Epstein also got federal immunity in exchange. So that's where this becomes a little more complicated, is that I think Epstein's lawyers would say, well, wait a minute.

00:27:55:08 - 00:28:24:20
Unknown
He did plead guilty to an 18 month jail, term in the state system. So it unlike a lot of NPAs that give a complete whitewash or complete immunity to any prosecution, Epstein was prosecuted in the state court system, and received, this, work release sentence as a result. But basically, both the federal prosecutor and the state prosecutor worked together to come up with this.

00:28:24:21 - 00:28:53:19
Unknown
You know, a federal judge had to approve it. A state judge had to approve it. Is is let me jump. Right. Let me jump in right there. The state judge had to approve the plea deal, but the plea deal was presented in such a way that Epstein was pleading guilty to two specific, acts of abuse and the, plea deal didn't reveal that there was this much broader, much more extensive sex trafficking organization.

00:28:53:21 - 00:29:28:21
Unknown
So the judge who approved the state part of the deal was essentially in the dark about the larger, contours of Epstein's organization. And now on the federal side, because it was an NPA between the federal government and the Epstein, it never was presented to federal court because it was simply an agreement. A contract, an NPA that said, the federal prosecutors agreed not to prosecute Epstein in exchange for his guilty plea, to to, low level state charges, in the, in the state system.

00:29:28:23 - 00:29:52:00
Unknown
And that's why when we presented our, our federal lawsuit, we were suddenly in federal court for the first time on the Epstein case. It had not been, in front of, Judge Marra or any other federal judge, in terms of this, this prosecution, question. And you keep referring to an NPA. What is that? What does the NPA stand for?

00:29:52:02 - 00:30:24:15
Unknown
The NPA stands for a non-prosecution agreement. So you might think about a case. Suppose there's a drug trafficking case going on, and the prosecutors want a low level person to reveal who they're delivering the drugs for and who who else is involved in the organization of prosecutors. And the defendant might enter into an NPA that says, look, we the federal prosecutors, will agree not to prosecute you, but in exchange, you agree to give us truthful testimony about who else is involved.

00:30:24:17 - 00:30:59:10
Unknown
And that's a, so an NPA is, as the name suggests, an agreement not to prosecute someone. And so that's what Epstein got from the federal system was an NPA, an agreement that the federal prosecutors in Florida would not prosecute. Okay. So he gets an NPA. But you just said that he was that he only pled guilty to two specific acts of abuse, and that the state court judge was kept in the dark about the larger trafficking network that he had created and, you know, trafficked these kids through.

00:30:59:10 - 00:31:24:10
Unknown
And and so what were those two specific acts of abuse that led to his sweetheart deal that he pled guilty to? Yeah, they were simply I shouldn't say simple. Let me rephrase it. The two acts of abuse were, to two specific, girls that I think actually, young women, they were been carefully curated so that they were not the more horrific acts of abuse.

00:31:24:10 - 00:31:59:17
Unknown
They were simply, two of the events that, had occurred over a long period of time. And because there was a stipulated sentence, this 18 month sentence, the judge wasn't given all of the information about the, full scope of the Epstein sex trafficking organization. And then there was no oftentimes people are familiar with, the process that of a pre-sentence report where the judge will get information about all of the aspects of the crime, all of the aspects of the defendant's background, all of the aspects of of the victims.

00:31:59:19 - 00:32:24:13
Unknown
None of that ordinary process was provided in the state system, because the deal had been organized to just be a quick in and out. Here's the agreement, judge. Here's he's pleading guilty. Here's the stipulated sentence. We ask you to just, bless this deal and be done with it. And in fairness to the state court judge, the state court judge didn't know much more about the case.

00:32:24:15 - 00:32:41:14
Unknown
The state prosecutors, who would traditionally be the ones who would explain to the judge the full parameters of what was going on, because the deal had been organized to keep Epstein's exposure, very, very confined. They didn't provide additional information to the judge.

00:32:41:14 - 00:32:58:04
Unknown
So Paul, you know, you have this ten years of trying to litigate on behalf of these victims, in, in federal court, the federal court judge finds that, in fact, their rights have been violated in this case.

00:32:58:04 - 00:33:24:22
Unknown
So what happened next? Well, we had a ruling from the judge that the victim's rights had been violated. But then the obvious question becomes, all right, what is the remedy for that? And we believe the appropriate remedy was to rip up the plea deal and go back to square one, because only then would the victims have an opportunity to confer about what the appropriate outcome was.

00:33:24:24 - 00:34:03:13
Unknown
So we filed briefs arguing that the NPA should be set aside. The immunity provisions should be should be set aside. And we were we were very pleased with our briefs because we thought they had made a a strong case for justice and for going back and making sure the victims rights were protected. But as the briefs had just been filed in front of the the federal district court judge in Florida, Epstein returned to the United States in the New York metropolitan area and was arrested by federal authorities there for sex trafficking and was taken into custody in New York.

00:34:03:15 - 00:34:31:17
Unknown
And you might say, but wait a minute, Paul, you were you were telling me that there was this NPA that had given Epstein, immunity from federal prosecution. The devil is in the details, as it often is in American law. The the specific issue here was, whether New York prosecutors were bound by the Florida NPA and the New York authorities took the position.

00:34:31:17 - 00:34:54:10
Unknown
It's actually pretty well supported in New York and another federal law that the federal prosecutor for Florida is in charge of cases down there. But the federal prosecutors in New York are the ones who make the final decisions there. And so Epstein's sex trafficking organization had to extend it not just to his home in Fort Lauderdale, but also in Manhattan and elsewhere.

00:34:54:10 - 00:35:18:14
Unknown
And so the New York prosecutors, were able to file federal charges against Epstein and have them arrested. So they did. They started moving forward, excuse me, in New York and, I think folks are generally aware of what happened. At that point, Epstein committed suicide bringing those cases, the New York cases, to a close.

00:35:18:16 - 00:35:49:15
Unknown
But the federal prosecutors in New York did charge killing Maxwell with her role in the sex trafficking organization. They convicted her. And that kind of brings the cases to a close up in New York, sadly, and in Florida, after we had worked for ten years to get, some kind of justice for the victims there. Once Epstein committed suicide, Judge Merrick concluded that the Florida case was moot.

00:35:49:17 - 00:36:11:14
Unknown
As the lawyers say, that since Epstein had died, there was no, way that he could be prosecuted. We filed, a motion to reconsider, saying, wait a minute. There are these other coconspirators, such as Maxwell, who are covered by the immunity provision, and that immunity provision should be eliminated so they can be prosecuted in Florida now.

00:36:11:15 - 00:36:38:20
Unknown
But the judge, trial court judge denied our motion. We then appealed to the 11th Circuit. And there were I think there was initially a hearing in front of a three judge panel and then, later a hearing in front of a much larger, about a dozen judges, a rehearing en banc and eventually with the 11th Circuit said is because no federal charges have been filed in Florida.

00:36:38:22 - 00:37:02:05
Unknown
There was no federal cause of action under the CRA. The CRA only kicked into effect once federal charges have been filed. And therefore, our case should never have been in court. And and I guess we we shouldn't have been litigating there for ten years. So that was the unfortunate, legal conclusion of what happened in that case.

00:37:02:05 - 00:37:33:14
Unknown
But the the fortunate, the sort of bright side of the case, if you will, is I think the case has shed a lot of light on issues surrounding federal prosecutors conferring with victims. I think it is fair to say, as a result of our, excuse me, I mean. I think it's fair to say that as a result of our case, there's been a lot of attention now paid by federal prosecutors to conferring with victims even before charges are filed.

00:37:33:16 - 00:38:08:06
Unknown
There was, an amendment to the CRA that Senator Feinstein from California, helped to pass in 2015 that said, for, certain kinds of pretrial resolutions, like a DPA, a deferred prosecution agreement, prosecutors have to confer, with the victims. And so we've seen, I think, as a result of Brad in my, efforts to, to highlight the failure to confer with the Epstein victims, greater attention being paid to victims, and other federal cases.

00:38:08:08 - 00:38:40:09
Unknown
Did you see greater respect for the victims and the 2018 case in New York? We did. And that's that's an interesting point. We have kind of a test case if you what did things look like before our efforts and what do they look like after, the US Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York, at the time, the attorney general, I'm sorry, the U.S. attorney with Jeff Berman, made a very, concerted effort to confer with the victims to keep them notified, to make sure their rights were respected.

00:38:40:11 - 00:39:14:13
Unknown
In fact, I mentioned earlier that the CRA allows victims to speak at a bail hearing. And so once, Epstein was arrested, the issue came up right away. I've. Should he be given, a bail? Should he be given pretrial release? And the judge allowed, Courtney, Brad and my, our client to speak and explain the the dangerousness of Epstein as sophisticated methods of sex trafficking and reasons to believe that he might use his vast wealth to to flee the country or otherwise continue his crimes.

00:39:14:13 - 00:39:49:17
Unknown
And so, we saw the victims rights being respected there. I mentioned also that Epstein committed suicide, and that led in New York to, dismissal of the charges against deputy mayor. And there, again, the judge was very solicitous of victims rights, even though there it was a foregone conclusion that the case was going to be dismissed. The judge held a hearing on the dismissal and invited all the victims to come in and give victim impact statements about the the harms that they had suffered from Epstein and the trauma that had resulted from the crimes he committed.

00:39:49:17 - 00:40:09:03
Unknown
And so I think there were about a dozen or two dozen of Epstein's victims who traveled to New York to speak at that hearing, the end at the end of which, of course, the judge had to dismiss the charges, but at least they were heard and were able to make, a public statement about the scope of Epstein's, sex trafficking organization.

00:40:09:05 - 00:40:33:20
Unknown
And I think part of the the attention that was focused on Epstein then carried over into, leading to the prosecution of, of Maxwell for her role in that, very serious, sex trafficking organization. We're the victims in the 2018 case where they the same victims as in the earlier case or or who were they? Some of them were the same, and some of them were different.

00:40:33:20 - 00:41:07:02
Unknown
Obviously, the connection, in the New York case had to be to New York jurisdiction, specifically Epstein's mansion, in New York. Whereas in the Florida case, the connection had to be to Epstein's mansion in, in Fort Lauderdale or. I'm sorry, I think it's actually Palm Beach, where his mansion is. So, that's, but they were they they were all the commonality was that, Epstein's sex trafficking continued on a daily basis, depending on wherever he was.

00:41:07:02 - 00:41:47:23
Unknown
The sex trafficking was, was ongoing. And so that was the, that was the the full scope of this, sex trafficking organization, which included other locations in the United States and even overseas as well. So I think about these victims and the tremendous courage and strength they must have shown all these years to, you know, survive these horrific acts of abuse to be ignored by both the federal and state prosecutors in that initial prosecution and to fight for over ten years for their rights.

00:41:48:00 - 00:42:12:23
Unknown
Can you tell us a little bit about what a about them and what moves them to fight for victims rights for that long period? Yeah, it's, you know, I'll I'll speak here about Courtney, who is one of our main clients, and she just knew this was wrong, that she was taken advantage of by an older and more powerful man when she was a child.

00:42:12:23 - 00:42:46:24
Unknown
And as she matured and realized exactly what had happened and the fact that the authorities had done nothing to protect her, she was outraged and wanted to tell the world what had happened and wanted to try to make it right. And so she she persisted over, as you say, I think, gosh, more than a a dozen years, and pursuing, not only the criminal action, many of the victims also pursued civil justice against Epstein by filing civil lawsuits, many of which were successful.

00:42:47:01 - 00:43:12:08
Unknown
One of the things about Courtney is because she was so, determined to hold Epstein accountable and to make the world different not only for the Epstein victims, but for victims of other, other similar kinds of crimes. She worked with her local congresswoman to, have a law proposed the Courtney Wyld Crime Victims Rights Act Reform Act.

00:43:12:10 - 00:43:31:14
Unknown
And so that legislation, was introduced in Congress a couple of years ago. I think it's a very good piece of legislation would would improve some of the, malfunctioning of the system that we saw in the Epstein case. Unfortunately, I think your listeners are probably aware there aren't a lot of bills that seem to be moving through Congress nowadays.

00:43:31:14 - 00:43:59:02
Unknown
So the legislation hasn't really received a hearing and hasn't been acted upon. But I'm hoping that soon Congress will take a look at that act again and, make some needed reforms to the crime victims. Crime victims, act and make those changes. So, so today, where we stand today in 2025, in the United States, Paul, where the gaps in the system, where do you think changes continue to need to be made?

00:43:59:04 - 00:44:26:23
Unknown
Well, I think one of the big issues is we do have the VRA that provides rights, and sometimes there are a few glitches here and there about how far does the act extend, or does it cover rights before charges are filed? But the biggest problem is getting lawyers for crime victims. I think I already mentioned that Brad and I spent literally several thousand hours working on a pro bono basis on this case.

00:44:27:00 - 00:44:50:19
Unknown
I'm a law professor at the University of Utah College of Law. Brad has, as a practice and a firm that, very generously allowed him to work on, this pro bono aspect of the case, for many years. But there were a lot of times where victims are just not going to be able to find attorneys who can donate time to pursue their, their cases.

00:44:50:21 - 00:45:22:06
Unknown
And as I mentioned, the litigation here was against the United States government, which has a very large legal team. Epstein had a very large legal team. So it's time consuming, and difficult, litigation. I think we need to think about how can we create, attorneys available to victims, many of whom, by the way, lack legal resources or lack, you know, may be indigent or have limited, limited means and aren't able to spend money to to litigate a case in the federal system.

00:45:22:08 - 00:45:44:17
Unknown
What we've done in a few states, for example, my home state of Utah has the Utah Crime Victims Legal Clinic, which will take cases, free of charge, for victims that have important issues in the the Utah criminal justice system or federal cases in Utah. I think we need and there's something like 7 or 8 clinics now around the country in 7 or 8 states.

00:45:44:19 - 00:46:09:06
Unknown
I think we need to expand those clinics to all 50 states, and make, legal counsel more available to victims. I think we also need to make sure the victims rights are enforceable. The Cvar does list the important rights, such as the right to confer with prosecutors and to be able to make statements at sentencing. But but sometimes those rights are not respected as the Epstein case.

00:46:09:08 - 00:46:30:00
Unknown
Illustrates. So I think we need to make sure that the law is written in such a way that victims of federal crimes or when you move into the state system, victims in the state system are able to effectively assert their rights and make sure that prosecutors and judges will protect, the victims interests in criminal justice cases.

00:46:30:02 - 00:46:52:15
Unknown
Oh, thank you so much for everything you did to help victims in the Epstein case. And I appreciate so much all of the work that you do to continue to help victims and survivors of crime worldwide. To our listeners, thank you for joining us today. Please tune in again soon for our next episode here on Radio Kempe.

00:46:52:15 - 00:47:09:05
Unknown
Thank you for listening to Radio Kempe. Stay connected by visiting our website at Kempecenter.org and follow us on social media.