- A letter allegedly from Jeffrey Epstein to Larry Nassar was included in a recent Justice Department document release.
- The letter’s authenticity is questionable as it was postmarked in Virginia three days after Epstein’s death in New York.
- Both Epstein and Nassar were convicted of sex crimes involving young women and girls.
(This story has been updated to include new information that the FBI is calling the letter a fake.)
The FBI is calling a letter alleged to be from Jeffrey Epstein to disgraced former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar a fake.
The letter was among the more than 29,000 documents released by the Justice Department on Tuesday, Dec. 23.
Nassar was sentenced in 2018 to 40 to 175 years in prison after pleading guilty to seven counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct for assaulting the young athletes he treated while working for both USA Gymnastics and Michigan State University. He was sentenced to 40 years to 125 years in another Michigan county, plus 60 years on federal child pornography charges.
The Department of Justice initially said it was investigating the authenticity of the handwritten letter. Later it put out a statement that the FBI was calling the letter a fake. Among the reasons:
- The writing does not appear to match Jeffrey Epstein’s.
- The letter was postmarked three days after Epstein’s death out of Northern Virginia, when he was jailed in New York.
- The return address did not list the jail where Epstein was held and did not include his inmate number, which is required for outgoing mail.
The latest batch of material from the Justice Department’s Epstein investigation included dozens of video clips and other documents with many redactions. The Justice Department said on social media that documents include ‘untrue and sensationalist claims’ against President Donald Trump before the 2020 election.
‘To be clear: the claims are unfounded and false, and if they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already,’ the Department of Justice added in a statement about Tuesday’s document release. ‘Nevertheless, out of our commitment to the law and transparency, the DOJ is releasing these documents with the legally required protections for Epstein’s victims.’
The president has not been accused of any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein, a wealthy and well-connected financier who was charged with sex trafficking.
More than 150 women shared their experiences of abuse as part of an award-winning Indy Star/USA TODAY Network investigation series related to how Nassar assaulted the athletes he treated for both USA Gymnastics and Michigan State University. Nassar was convicted of abusing gymnasts under the premise of giving them medical exams. Nassar’s accusers included Olympic gold medal winners such as Simone Biles, Gabby Douglas, Jordyn Wieber, McKayla Maroney and Aly Raisman.
Epstein was charged by federal authorities with operating a sex-trafficking ring that preyed on young women and underage girls before he died in 2019.