Have other Epstein crimes gone unpunished?

The same can be said of potential financial malfeasance committed by individuals named in the Epstein files—with one glaring difference.

Coming up on seven years after Epstein’s death, investigators can still redeem themselves in the case of sex crimes and look to prosecute individuals, as in many instances there is no statute of limitations for sex trafficking and rape.

By contrast, statutes of limitations for financial crimes tend to be limited. That’s unfortunate, because the Epstein files document any number of financial activities that might have risen to the level of prompting an investigation by the authorities.

“Generally, the statute of limitations is five years for securities cases,” says John C. Coffee Jr., a Columbia Law School professor and expert on white-collar crimes. Bank fraud typically carries a 10-year statute of limitations. Criminal tax fraud cases would bump against a six-year statute of limitations, though there is no time limit for civil tax fraud, which entails lesser violations.

According to a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, in December 2009, Jes Staley, then a senior executive at JPMorgan Chase, emailed internal documents pertaining to the compensation of the bank’s top executives to Epstein. In 2010 Epstein bought JPMorgan preferred stock worth “at least $5.7 million worth in early 2019.”

In another instance in 2010, Staley sent Epstein an “FYI” email about a deal in which Chicago billionaire Thomas Pritzker was selling half of the credit-reporting company TransUnion to a private-equity firm, according to the Journal. TransUnion was private at the time, but its competitors Equifax and Experian were not.

It’s not known if Epstein, who made his living in part by investing, made any stock moves based on these tips. Both, though, might have set off alarm bells to regulators. A spokesperson for Pritzker declined to comment.

Staley couldn’t be reached for comment, and his lawyer, Brendan Sullivan, didn’t respond to requests for comment. In the past, Staley has stated that while he was friends with Epstein, he regrets the relationship and denies knowing about Epstein’s crimes. Sullivan has previously said that allegations that Staley aided sex trafficking operations were “baseless.” JPMorgan told Barron’s, “We were not aware that Staley had shared confidential information until long after he left the bank.”

A person close to the matter notes that Staley conceded in testimony that he didn’t receive permission to share confidential JPMorgan information with Epstein, and given that, the bank wouldn’t have known how Epstein may have used the information.

Bill Gates’ longtime science adviser, Boris Nikolic—whose name appears in the Epstein files thousands of times—sent Epstein private information about a genomic oncology company, Foundation Medicine, in 2013 and 2014 before and after the company went public. The Journal reports that “Gates—and his representatives—received access to confidential financial information as a major early investor in Foundation Medicine. Nikolic, in turn, sent some documents discussing the investment to Epstein.” Gates didn’t respond to requests for comment. Previously, he has expressed requests for his past association with Epstein, describing it as a “huge mistake.”

Epstein bought the stock when it was public and appeared to make a tidy profit. Medical giant Roche bought Foundation in 2018 for $2.4 billion. Nikolic told the Journal he didn’t share any nonpublic material information with Epstein. Nikolic didn’t respond to a request for comment. “Prior to the publication of the Epstein files, we were not aware of any interactions of Boris Nikolic with Epstein,” a spokesperson for Roche told Barron’s.

In 2013, Steven Sinofsky, Microsoft’s former Windows president, sent Epstein internal emails between Sinofsky and then-CEO Steve Ballmer and Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner about how a key product was about to “catastrophically fail.” The emails were from nine months earlier, in late 2012, and by then Microsoft had acknowledged the failure and Sinofsky had left the company. Though one could read the email thread as stale or mundane, it contains sensitive strategic information about Microsoft, which could have been invaluable to Epstein.

Would the activity that Staley, Nikolic, and Sinofsky engaged in at least rise to the level where it might warrant regulatory scrutiny? “Absolutely,” says David Rosenfeld, professor of law at Northern Illinois University and a former co-head of enforcement for the Securities and Exchange Commission in New York. “It all depends upon the facts, but yes, the SEC or Finra looks into these kinds of things.”

Barron’s asked the SEC if it is or had investigated Staley, Nikolic, or Sinofsky for insider trading, and if these activities would have risen to the level of insider trading. An SEC spokesperson emailed back, “The SEC does not comment on the existence or nonexistence of a possible investigation.”

Then there’s Epstein’s accountant Kahn and Epstein’s long-serving lawyer Darren Indyke, sole executors of Epstein’s estate, who have been deeply intertwined with all manner of financial dealings of Epstein and his empire.

In 2022, the U.S. Virgin Islands settled a lawsuit resolving “a law enforcement action filed in 2020 under the anti-criminal enterprise, sex trafficking, child exploitation and fraud laws of the Virgin Islands,” which the territory filed against Epstein’s estate and the executors, Indyke and Kahn. The estate agreed to pay more than $105 million as part of the settlement.

Both Indyke and Kahn testified before a closed hearing at the congressional Committee on Oversight and Government Reform in March. After Kahn’s testimony, ranking member Rep. Robert Garcia (D., Calif.) released a statement noting, “During his deposition, Kahn…admitted to impersonating Epstein in communication with banks.”

Kahn’s lawyer Daniel Ruzumna told Barron’s, “With respect to the alleged impersonation of Epstein, Mr. Kahn testified that his interactions with bankers was always at Epstein’s request and were never intended to defraud anyone. Mr. Kahn has not violated any banking, tax, or other law—he has never been accused of such a violation by any federal, state, or local authority, and, to the best of our knowledge, has never been investigated for such a violation.”

Indyke’s lawyer Dan Weiner told Barron’s, “No government agency anywhere has ever charged Mr. Indyke with any criminal violation of banking law, tax law or any other law, and (2) no court anywhere has ever found Mr. Indyke guilty of any misconduct of any kind.”

Both Kahn and Indyke have denied any knowledge of Epstein’s sex crimes.

Leon Black, former CEO and co-founder of Apollo Global Management, famously paid Epstein between $158 million and $170 million for tax and estate planning between 2012 and 2017. A recent New York Times article, however, suggests that some of those payments appear to go far beyond monies for tax services. Furthermore, some of Black’s financial transactions could be construed as running afoul of the nation’s tax code, according to Sen. Ron Wyden (D., Ore.), the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee.

A detailed 20-page letter from Wyden dated March 20, which asks Black to respond to 27 questions, states: “Files released by the DOJ continue to undermine your assertion that Epstein provided uniquely valuable tax and estate planning advice—and the files raise significant new questions about your compliance with our nation’s tax laws.”

Black is scheduled to testify on May 13 before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, which is investigating the Epstein case on a number of fronts, and Black may face questions about the payments.

Barron’s asked the Internal Revenue Service if it was investigating Black but received no reply. A lawyer for Black pointed to a previous statement that read: “All of the payments Mr. Black has made and the gift taxes he paid were vetted and approved by legal and accounting experts.”

While the individuals mentioned above may be protected by the statute of limitations, and of course may be innocent, the Epstein affair is far from over. Could any of these individuals or others simply be charged with conspiracy to commit financial crimes?

“I think the conspiracy charges cannot be used as easily as you suggest to overcome the statute—otherwise prosecutors could allege that the conspiracy continued until the defendants confessed,” says Columbia’s Coffee.

Still, it may yet be the case that additional disclosures will ensnare either these people or those who had more recent dealings with Epstein. And it may be financial dealings that prove to be their undoing.

In England, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former Prince Andrew, was arrested in March on suspicion of misconduct in public office. The investigation, which is ongoing, concerns allegations he passed confidential trade information to Epstein during his time as a U.K. trade envoy. The former U.K. ambassador to the U.S., Peter Mandelson, was also arrested on suspicion of passing sensitive government information to Epstein. Mountbatten-Windsor has made no statement about his arrest. Mandelson’s lawyers said, “The arrest was prompted by a baseless suggestion that he was planning to leave the country and take up permanent residence abroad.”

If nailing members of Epstein’s clique for financial crimes is akin to convicting Al Capone on tax charges rather than being the mob boss of Chicago, and perhaps less than fully satisfying, it is still better than what we have now, which is to say, crickets.

“All these figures think that it’s going [away] when [Epstein] dies.… They basically lied about it before, they’ve rationalized it one way or another,” Warren Buffett said in a recent CNBC interview.

“Anybody that was involved in Epstein, they’ve been miserable from the moment they learned that things are going to get released,” Buffett said. “They can’t bury it now. It’s gone too far. And I’m sure that once you get rid of redacting a few things, you’re going to learn more.”

In fact, learning more might go a long way to changing the course of Epstein prosecutions from shameful “coulda, shoulda, woulda” to justice.

Write to Andy Serwer at andy.serwer@barrons.com