Gary King — "I don't think I've ever met him personally"

In 2004 Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein each put $4,000 into Gary King's campaign for Congress, filing from the same St. Thomas address. In 2006 King said he had never met Epstein and would give his money back. In August 2010, one day after the state decided Epstein need not register as a sex offender, and two weeks after Epstein's lawyer told the state his client had not set foot in New Mexico since his conviction, an assistant in the attorney general's own office set up a meeting between the two men at a Santa Fe restaurant. In 2014 Epstein's staff arranged the candidate a private jet, and Epstein told his accountant the fare could be paid "through two diffent entities 10 4." Deutsche Bank and federal prosecutors were reading the same name in their own files years before any of it was news. This report follows the paper, and stops where it stops.

What was already known, and what this adds

The outline of the September 8, 2014 flight has been public since February 2026. NM Political Report and the Albuquerque Journal established that Gary King, then attorney general and the Democratic nominee for governor, flew with running mate Deb Haaland on a Hawker chartered through Epstein's company JEGE LLC, that King's campaign later listed a $22,060 payment to the charter operator, and that Epstein-linked companies were giving to the campaign in the same weeks. The Journal printed Epstein's "11.6 … 10 4" email verbatim without interpreting it. Reuters added in March that King's campaign returned $35,600 to Epstein companies three days after the story broke, a line Part VII below tests against the campaign's own filings.

This report reads the same emails against the charter operator's written quote, which the coverage did not cite, and against the trip sheet, the campaign's original 2014 finance filings and the state's contribution database, which the coverage cited for totals but did not compare with Epstein's figures. Together they show a fare that was split on paper, with the campaign's share paid in full and Epstein's share arriving as two corporate contributions.

It then does what the coverage has not done, which is to read the rest of the file. Four bodies of record sit around the charter and have gone unused. The campaign's own 2004 federal filings name Ghislaine Maxwell as a donor. The state's sex offender file on Epstein, and the flight manifests for August 2010, put the reported meeting inside the weeks the state spent deciding whether he had to register. Deutsche Bank's compliance records and a September 2019 presentation to federal prosecutors use King's name to identify four of Epstein's shell companies. And the land office file on the ranch lease is addressed, over and over, to the attorney general's cousin.

What the coverage has said

Twelve articles were fetched in full and read for this report. In February and March 2026, NM Political Report published the trip sheet, the charter by JEGE LLC, the campaign's $22,060 payment to Injet, the JEGE deposits recorded in the state system, the first half of Epstein's August 21 message, and the corporations paragraph with the Indyke exchange, which it dated to June 18. It also reported that a staffer in the attorney general's office used official government email to arrange a 2010 meeting with Epstein at a Santa Fe restaurant. The Albuquerque Journal printed the "11.6 … 10 4" email verbatim without interpreting it, and carried King saying he thought the jet came from NetJets and his finance director saying Epstein had offered the plane after a conversation with Bill Richardson. ICT carried Deb Haaland's spokesperson. KOB carried King on February 19 and February 28, including his statement that the campaign "paid fair market value" and that he returned Epstein's 2006 money after 2009. Reuters reported in March that the campaign returned $35,600 three days after the story broke, quoted King's statement that he had told Epstein the campaign would not accept his contributions, gave King's account of the Jinja meeting as tea and condolences, and reported that he had not returned the 2006 money. The Santa Fe New Mexican's King family piece identified Jerry King as Bruce King's nephew and a point person for Epstein's staff in land dealings. Behind all of it stand the two Santa Fe New Mexican stories of September 9 and 10, 2014 and The Daily Beast's 2019 piece on Epstein's giving.

What we could not find in it. Each of those articles was fetched and searched on September 4, 2026. We were not able to find any mention in them of the 2004 contributions from Ghislaine Maxwell or of Eric Gany. Maxwell is named in the 2019 Daily Beast piece, as Epstein's associate and as the defendant in the Giuffre litigation, not as a donor to anyone. Nor were we able to find any mention of the July and August 2010 correspondence between the Department of Public Safety and Epstein's lawyer; of the passenger manifests for his two August 2010 trips; of the August 26 change to the meeting time; of Deutsche Bank's screening files or its September 2019 presentation to federal prosecutors; of the February 2020 privilege term; or of the 2004 land office memoranda addressed to Jerry King, though the Santa Fe New Mexican reported the fact that he was a point person and cited a 2004 land office letter. We were also not able to find the comparison this report draws in Part VI between Epstein's "10 4" instruction and the two September 1 contributions.

That is a statement about a defined set of articles and about the searches we ran, both of which are described so a reader can repeat them. It is not a claim that nothing has ever been published on these points. Web searches on these terms were attempted on September 3 and 4, 2026 and were repeatedly rate-limited, so no weight is placed on them here.

What this report does not claim. No document reviewed here shows that King knew of any crime at Zorro Ranch, that any victim complaint reached his office, or that his office had anything to do with the state's decision not to require Epstein to register. Those three absences are stated here so that they are not read into anything below.

Related reports. Zorro Ranch investigation, part 2 covers the ranch and the King family's 1993 sale. The Plaskett investigation documents Cecile de Jongh's role in Epstein's Virgin Islands office, which appears below.

I. 2004: the first checks

June to September · $14,000 into a congressional race

The first Epstein money in Gary King's record is ten years older than the charter. In 2004 King ran for Congress in New Mexico's second district, losing to the incumbent, Steve Pearce. His committee, King for Congress, filed from a post office box in Carlsbad (FEC C00393702).

Four donors from Epstein's circle appear in that year's reports, in the committee's own electronic filings. Three of the names are familiar from the 2014 material: Epstein himself, his lawyer Darren Indyke, and, at Epstein's Virgin Islands address, Ghislaine Maxwell. The fourth needs an introduction.

Sources: the campaign's July quarterly report, covering May 13 to June 30, 2004 (filing 127614, Schedule A, transactions C2613 and C2614), and its October quarterly report, covering July 1 to September 30 (filing 140986, transactions C4087, C4088, C4959, C4962 and C4963). Both are original reports, form F3N, filed by the committee itself. The seven lines total $14,000.

The Epstein and Maxwell gifts appear twice each because the campaign designated one of each pair to the primary, where it retired debt, and the other to the general. They are two separate receipts, not one receipt reported twice. The filing carries a distinct transaction identifier for each, and the two Maxwell lines read as follows in the campaign's own submission:

SA11AI,"C00393702","IND",...,"Saint Thomas","VI","","O2004","Debt Primary","Retired","",4000,20040901,2000,...,"C4962",...,"Maxwell","Ghislaine"
SA11AI,"C00393702","IND",...,"Saint Thomas","VI","","G2004","","Retired","",4000,20040901,2000,...,"C4963",...,"Maxwell","Ghislaine"

The field order is election code, election description, occupation, then the running aggregate for that donor, the receipt date, and the receipt amount. Both lines show $2,000 received on September 1, 2004 against a $4,000 cycle aggregate. The Federal Election Commission's own itemized receipts viewer for the same filing shows the pair as two rows, "6100 Red Hook Quarter B-3, Saint Thomas, Virgin Islands," occupation "Retired," each $2,000 on 09/01/2004 against an aggregate of $4,000. That viewer suppresses contributor names, which is why the name is cited to the filing itself. The same lines survive into the committee's December 2, 2004 amendment (filing 154878).

Two things in that table are not in the 2026 coverage reviewed for this report. The first is Maxwell's name. The second is the address. 6100 Red Hook Quarter B-3 is the address the Santa Fe New Mexican identified ten years later, in September 2014, as the address shared by the companies then giving to King's campaign for governor. It was already the address the campaign recorded for Epstein and for Maxwell in 2004.

Who Eric Gany is

The fourth donor is the least known and the most specific. Eric Gany gave $2,000 on August 31, 2004, filing from 66 Little Brook Road, Wilton, Connecticut, and giving his employer as NY Strategy Group, LLC.

JPMorgan Chase's own account records, produced in the Epstein litigation, describe him. A 2003 client file for Ghislaine Maxwell gives her primary address as care of New York Strategy Group, "Attn: Eric Gany," at 457 Madison Avenue in New York (EFTA01582904). That is the Madison Avenue address Epstein's Zorro Trust used on its New Mexico land office correspondence, and the address the state's database carries for Epstein's own 2005 contribution to King.

The bank's summary of findings on Maxwell is blunter:

She is now in the process of opening up a new checking account, which Eric Gany will have POA. Eric works for Jeffrey Epstein (EFTA01582905)

The same file carries a Dun & Bradstreet record for "ERIC T GANY" at 66 Little Brook Rd, Wilton, Connecticut (EFTA01582907), the address on the campaign's FEC line. So all four of the 2004 donors are Epstein, his lawyer, his longtime associate, and a man his bank file describes as working for him and holding power of attorney over her account.

None of this is hidden. The contributions sit in the campaign's own filing with the Federal Election Commission, and the research database LittleSis has logged "Ghislaine Maxwell gave money to Gary King," $4,000, dated September 1, 2004 (LittleSis entity 44872). Epstein's 2004 giving to King is known well enough that King's Wikipedia entry records it.

What we could not find is any account of it. Searching the twelve articles fetched for this report, we were not able to find Maxwell named as a contributor to King in any of them, or any mention of Eric Gany, or any instance of the 2004 contributions being set beside what King said in 2006.

2005 and 2006 · Two personal checks, then "I don't think I've ever met him personally"

King became attorney general in the 2006 election. The state's contribution database records two contributions from Jeffrey Epstein personally to that campaign, $10,000 on December 5, 2005 and $5,000 on June 19, 2006 (dataset 392).

On August 16, 2006, after Epstein's Florida arrest became public, the Santa Fe New Mexican listed the New Mexico politicians holding his money: $50,000 to Bill Richardson's 2002 campaign and another $50,000 that year through The Zorro Trust, $15,000 to King, $10,000 to land commissioner candidate Jim Baca, and $2,000 to Santa Fe County Sheriff Greg Solano. King said his was going back.

King said Tuesday that "to avoid any appearance of impropriety," he plans to return the $15,000 to Epstein.

"I don't think I've ever met him personally," King said. "He knows other members of my family better." (EFTA01661603 p.30)

Two years before he said that, a donor listing Epstein's St. Thomas address and the occupation "Retired" had written his congressional campaign two checks, and Epstein's lawyer had written two more. Whether King knew either fact is not in the record.

One correction belongs here, because it has been repeated for a decade. In September 2014 the same newspaper reported that the 2006 money "an Epstein company called The Zorro Trust had contributed" (EFTA01296377 p.2). The 2006 article says the opposite: the Zorro Trust money was Richardson's, and King's $15,000 is listed separately. The state database records King's 2005 and 2006 contributions under Epstein's own name.

II. 2010: the registry file, and the meeting

The meeting at Jinja has been reported. Contemporaneous emails put it at 3:30 pm, later moved to 4:30, and King has described it as tea, so this report calls it a meeting rather than a lunch. NM Political Report established in February 2026 that "a staffer in the New Mexico Attorney General's Office reached out to Epstein and his assistant using official government emails to arrange for an afternoon meeting for Epstein 'with AG Gary King' at a Santa Fe restaurant," and King has given his account of it to Reuters. What has not been published is the calendar around it. The same DOJ release holds the state's sex offender file on Epstein and the flight manifests for the two trips he made to New Mexico that month. Read in order, they show the state sending Epstein a registration notice on July 23, which his lawyer was then told was a form letter rather than a determination, and telling him on August 19 that he did not have to register, with his two trips to New Mexico bracketing that decision and the attorney general's meeting set the day after it.

July 23 · The state tells him to register

The New Mexico Department of Public Safety wrote to "Jeffery E. Epstein, 49 Zorro Ranch Rd., Stanley, NM." The letter is signed by Regina Chacon, assistant bureau chief of the Law Enforcement Records Bureau, and copied to the Santa Fe County Sheriff.

The New Mexico Department of Public Safety (DPS) has received notification from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement advising that you are a convicted sex offender and that you meet the requirement to register in New Mexico. Pursuant to NMSA 29-11a-1, a convicted sex offender who resides in New Mexico shall register with the County Sheriff no later than ten (10) days after establishing residence in this state. Do not hesitate; failure to comply with the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act will result in a 4th degree Felony. (EFTA00728275)

July 27 and 30 · His lawyer answers

Epstein's New Mexico counsel was Peter Schoenburg of Rothstein, Donatelli. He replied on July 27 that his client would register voluntarily under the federal statute "upon his next visit to the New Mexico vacation home," and added, "at your suggestion, I intend to have Mr. Epstein call the Santa Fe Sheriffs whenever he is in New Mexico to alert them of his presence at the Stanley home" (EFTA00727954).

He wrote again on July 30, recording what Chacon had told him by telephone that day.

The July 23, 2010 letter is a form letter sent out to every offender, and the local Sheriff's Office, about whom New Mexico receives notice from another state, regardless of the qualifying offense(s). The letter does not reflect a determination by your office that Mr. Epstein actually qualifies under NM law as an offender who is required to report. I understand that you will ask your assistant Theresa Hernandez to look into the materials attached to my fax, gather any additional materials needed, and make your own determination whether Mr. Epstein has a New Mexico state SORNA reporting obligation. (EFTA00730001)

The same letter contains the representation that the rest of the month overtook.

As you know, Mr Epstein has only recently been released from service of his sentence and has not visited NM since his conviction in Florida. I understand there is no requirement, under any circumstances, to make a special trip to New Mexico to register. (EFTA00730001)

August 13 · He lands in Albuquerque

Fourteen days later, Epstein's Gulfstream flew him into New Mexico. The Hyperion Air passenger manifest for N909JE, a G-1159B, records the leg as St. Thomas to Albuquerque on 8/13/2010, departing 4:49 pm and arriving 8:11 pm, with Larry Visoski among the pilots. Six passengers are listed. The first is Jeffrey Epstein. The fourth and fifth are the ranch manager and his wife, written on the form as Brice Gorden and Karen Gorden. The other three are redacted (HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006120, page image).

The state's review was still open when he landed. Chacon did not write again for six more days.

August 18 · Out to Gunnison

On August 17 at 2:11 am Epstein moved his own schedule up a day. "lets move up schedule 1 day„ tarry should fly in tuesday , today„ go to gunnision wed. arrive new york wed night." A staff member confirmed the next morning, "Wheelsup still 9am tomorrow morning to Gunnison?" (EFTA00757727). The manifests show the aircraft leaving Albuquerque for Gunnison, Colorado on August 18 and continuing to Teterboro the same day, with Epstein, a passenger listed only as "Nick," and three redacted names aboard (HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006119, HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006118).

August 19 · The state decides he need not register

The day after he left the state, Chacon wrote again to the Zorro Ranch address.

After reviewing your file it is our determination that under the current NMSA 29-11A you are not required to register with the State of New Mexico at this time for your 2008 Florida conviction of Procuring Person Under 18 for Prostitution. However, while you reside temporarily in New Mexico you may be required to register per Title I of the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006. (EFTA00731095)

That letter was also copied to the Santa Fe County Sheriff. It is the document Epstein's lawyers produced for the next nine years whenever the question came up, and the one his defense filed with the federal court in 2019.

August 20 · The attorney general's office sets the meeting

The next day, an assistant in the New Mexico attorney general's office emailed Epstein's scheduler, Lesley Groff, from [email protected], under the subject line "MEETNG WITH AG GARY KING IN SANTA FE."

Here are the arrangement we spoke about on the telephone just awhile ago -
AG King can meet with Mr. Ebstein at 3:30 p.m. on August 28th.

The message gives the restaurant, "Jinja Bar and Bistro located in the De Vargas Shopping Center @ 510 No. Guadalupe Street," and two sets of driving directions. The header gives the sender as "Wood, Elisa" and the message is signed "Lisa Wood." A follow-up at 3:08 pm that afternoon adds one line: "P.S. AG King's cell number is," followed by a redaction. Groff forwarded the confirmation onward on August 24, noting that she had already sent it the week before to Brice and to a recipient whose name is redacted. Epstein forwarded the whole chain to himself on the morning of the meeting (EFTA00779086).

The public account of that meeting is King's. He told Reuters he met Epstein only once, at Jinja in 2010, that they drank tea, that Epstein offered condolences after his father's death, and that they briefly discussed Epstein's dealings with the Santa Fe Institute. Bruce King had died on November 13, 2009, nine months before the meeting.

August 25 to 30 · The second trip

Epstein came back. The manifests record Teterboro to Phoenix and Phoenix to Albuquerque on August 25, carrying Epstein, a passenger listed as Igor Zinoviev, and two redacted passengers (HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006117, HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006116).

The next day, two days before the meeting, Epstein's office relayed a call.

Gary Kings assistant called and said Mr King can meet with you this Saturday in Santa Fe at 4:30pm(not 3:30pm as was originally scheduled)
I have given Renee the address to where you are going and she will arrange for you to be driven. (EFTA00895604, page image)

Epstein answered "ok." The time in the attorney general's written confirmation was 3:30. The meeting was moved to 4:30, at the request of King's assistant, and Epstein was to be driven to it. Both times are documented. No document in the release records what time the two men actually sat down.

On August 27, the day after the time changed, an Orbitz confirmation was issued for a commercial itinerary from New York LaGuardia through Dallas to Santa Fe, arriving at 3:35 pm on August 28. The passenger name is redacted. The confirmation was forwarded from Epstein's own account the next day (EFTA02422860). That arrival falls five minutes after the originally scheduled time and fifty five minutes before the time the meeting was moved to. Nothing in the record identifies the traveler or connects that ticket to the meeting, and this report does not.

The day after the meeting, a Sunday, the ranch had a houseguest. Epstein's assistant wrote on August 27 that "Dr. Merkin will be landing in Santa Fe on Sunday at 10:40am," asked whether to "invite Seth Lloyd over on Sunday," and forwarded the arrival details, including the tail number of the aircraft. Epstein answered with the names of the two people who should collect him (EFTA00779059).

The aircraft left Albuquerque for Teterboro on August 30 at 5:49 pm. Six people are on the manifest. Epstein is the first and a passenger written as "Igor" is the third. Four names are redacted (HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006115, page image). Four passengers flew in on August 25 and six flew out on August 30. Two people joined the aircraft in New Mexico. Who they were is behind the redaction bars, and this report does not speculate.

What the file does not show

Epstein did register with the Santa Fe County Sheriff, on his own lawyers' account. A Kirkland & Ellis memorandum of October 7, 2010 states that "notwithstanding the Sstate's determination that he need not register, Mr. Epstein voluntarily chose to register with New Mexico authorities in order to comply with federal requirements" (EFTA00727403 p.7), and Darren Indyke told a Santa Fe County sheriff's detective in May 2012 that Epstein "nevertheless registered with the Santa Fe County Sheriff in an effort to comply with federal" requirements (EFTA01147516). The registration form itself, its date, and any sheriff's log of his visits are not in the DOJ release. They would come from the county. Nothing here establishes when he first appeared at the sheriff's office or what he wrote on the form.

Nothing in the release connects the attorney general or his office to the registry decision. There is no document showing that anyone at the Department of Justice for New Mexico, then called the Office of the Attorney General, was consulted, copied, or informed. The determination was made inside the Department of Public Safety, and the reasoning is not in the file either. That gap was noticed at the time by a federal judge. Denying Epstein bail in July 2019, Judge Richard Berman wrote:

The Court requested from the Defense all application materials that Mr. Epstein may have submitted to the New Mexico Department of Public Safety, believing that the Department would not initiate the waiver of Mr. Epstein's sex offense registration on its own. No such materials have been received by the Court as of this date. (EFTA00039383 p.20)

What the documents establish is the order of events, not a cause. On July 30 Epstein's lawyer told the state his client had not been to New Mexico since his conviction. On August 13 he arrived. On August 19 the state wrote that he need not register. On August 20 the attorney general's office confirmed a 3:30 pm meeting with him for the following Saturday. On August 25 he flew back. On August 26 King's assistant moved the meeting to 4:30, and on August 28 the two men met. King was on the ballot that November, and won a second term as attorney general (Wikipedia).

III. The request

August 21, 2014 · "possibly using your plane"

Epstein's assistant told him on Thursday, August 21, that King had asked about his plane:

Please call Gary King when you have a moment...He said he was returning your call but also wanted to speak to you about possibly using your plane to get him from Sante Fe evening of Sept 8th (around 8pm) so he could make a breakfast in DC on Sept 9th...he says he can pay for the fuel and landing/airport fees...He said another option might be to take the Jet Blue red eye flight to NY and then borrow your plane to go to DC from NY...that could work for him as well... (EFTA00364267)

As relayed by the assistant, King proposed two routings, both on Epstein's aircraft, and offered to cover fuel and fees, and he was returning Epstein's call. NM Political Report quoted the first half of this message in February. The fuel offer and the second routing were not part of that coverage.

Epstein's own plane did not make the trip. At 4:59 pm the same day he wrote to his pilot, Larry Visoski, "gary king needs a cheap charter from sfe , to wash dc. on the eve of sept 8 at 8 pm." Visoski came back that night with a Learjet 55 at "$26,875 all fees and taxes included" and said he was waiting on other operators. Epstein replied "check empty leg" (EFTA00650515, EFTA00995439). By the next afternoon Visoski was pricing a Hawker with a broker at Injet, an ACP Jets company, and discussing whether Santa Fe's altitude and evening temperatures would allow a nonstop to Dulles (EFTA00364053 pp.3–4). The Albuquerque Journal carried the "cheap charter" line in February and dated the email August 22.

IV. The arrangement, Monday, August 25

11:26 am · Epstein's instruction

Epstein wrote to his accountant Richard Kahn and to Visoski:

lets orgainze the jet for gary king he can pay 11.6 we can arrange to pay through two diffent entities 10 4 please call his gyy chris khoury (EFTA00364043)

Chris Khoury was the campaign's finance director. His name and phone number appear on the campaign's own solicitation letters to Epstein (EFTA00367846). Visoski forwarded Epstein's message inside the office at 11:52 am with the question "who is Chris Khoury? and who is Gary King, lol". A colleague whose name is redacted answered five minutes later: "not sure on Chris Khoury! Gary King is running for Gov. of New Mexico! He has an early meeting in Washington DC on Sept. 9th" (EFTA00364043).

11:34 am · "my boss approved"

Visoski told the broker to proceed before the written quote arrived. "Ok Let's confirm the trip, my boss approved, Temps have been in the 57 degrees Pls fwd invoice for Sept 9th SAF-IAD" (EFTA00364053 p.2). The "Sept 9th" was a slip; when Visoski later wrote that the date "has been changed", the broker replied "a bit confused, we've only discussed 9/8", and the quote itself carried September 8.

11:42 am · The quote

Injet sent quotation #23274 for a Hawker 800XP, Santa Fe to Dulles on September 8, with Larry Visoski and Jege LLC in the "Prepared For" field. Subtotal $20,523.40, tax $1,537.50, quote total $22,060.90 (EFTA00364041 p.2; duplicate at EFTA00364038). The quote's itinerary showed a 9:00 am departure; the campaign wanted 8:00 pm, and the operator's final trip sheet carries 8:00 pm (EFTA00310528).

11:45 to 11:52 am · The attorney general's office, and "office and $"

Visoski circulated the quote to Kahn and to Epstein's assistant as "Charter for Gary King., Sept 9th 8pm departure Santefe to Washington DC IAD Dulles airport" (EFTA00364038). The assistant replied at 11:50 with contact details for the passenger:

oh great! So Jeffrey is helping out Gary? Do I need to do anything here? Let me pass along Gary King's info:
Attorney General Gary King
408 Galisteo Street
Villagra Building
Santa Fe New Mexico 87501
Victoria is Gary's assistant (EFTA00364041)

The Villagra Building at 408 Galisteo Street is the Office of the Attorney General (New Mexico Department of Justice, contact page). The details Epstein's office circulated for a campaign charter were the state office and an assistant identified only as "Victoria", not the campaign's post office box in Moriarty that appears on the June 13 and June 17 solicitation letters. The operator's final trip sheet lists Visoski, not King's office, as the contact, so the address stayed inside Epstein's chain (EFTA00310528). Why the state office was the reference point is not explained in any document.

Kahn answered at 11:52:

i will take care of gary king office and $ (EFTA00364041)

Kahn signed as HBRK Associates Inc., 575 Lexington Avenue. His firm had given King's campaign $5,200 nine weeks earlier (Part V).

12:59 pm · "Lead passenger Gary King"

Visoski corrected the itinerary with the broker and named the passenger. "Departure date has been changed, does this pose an issue? Pax wants to depart Sept 8th evening estimate 8pm SAF-IAD Total 4 to 5 Pax total., Lead passenger Gary King., Pls cc my NYC office Mr. Richard Kahn CFO" (EFTA00364053 pp.1–2).

V. The money

June · The campaign explains how corporations can give

The charter sits inside a longer money sequence. King won the Democratic primary on June 3 (Wikipedia). On June 5 Epstein asked his assistant to reach King, the assistant spoke with King's assistant Victoria, and that afternoon the campaign emailed Epstein's office a letter over King's signature, which his assistant forwarded to him the next morning. "Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today … I also want to thank you for your personal commitment to raise $50,000.00 for my campaign" (EFTA00368519; the call sequence is at EFTA00368401 and EFTA00368431).

A June 13 version of the same letter, re-addressed "C/O Darrin Indyke," added a paragraph.

Under New Mexico campaign finance law individuals, PACs and corporations can contribute up to $5,200 per election cycle. Each separate corporation is considered to be a separate giver and can give up to the maximum allowed, as long as the entity was not formed solely for the purpose of giving. (EFTA00304889)

On June 17 at 12:06 pm, Epstein's lawyer Darren Indyke flagged that King's platform page was titled "CRIMES AGAINST CHILDREN" and asked whether Epstein risked "additional news coverage regarding his accepting of your contributions." Epstein answered at 12:24 pm, "good catch, lets use co s or trusts" (EFTA00870192). At 7:34 pm that evening the campaign sent the letter a third time, again with the corporations paragraph, under the subject line "Information on PAC contributions" (EFTA00367846). The next morning it went to Indyke and Kahn (EFTA00367856). NM Political Report described this language and the Indyke exchange but dated the letter June 18. The corporations paragraph existed by June 13, four days before Indyke raised the press question.

State records show what followed. The Accountability Project's copy of New Mexico's legacy campaign finance database (dataset 392) and the campaign's Fourth Primary report, submitted July 3 and preserved on Scribd, list Darren Indyke personally, $5,200 on June 17; HBRK Associates Inc., $5,200 on June 23; and Neptune, LLC, $5,200 on June 23. Neptune's check is in the corpus, dated June 17, the day of "co s or trusts" (EFTA01348769, page image). The Indyke and HBRK contributions were reported by The Daily Beast in April 2019.

Four more Red Hook entities gave $5,000 each on July 7. The campaign's First General report, submitted September 8 and preserved on Scribd, records them as JEGE, LLC; FT RealEstate; Laurel, Inc.; and Nautilus, Inc. The version of the First General report carried in the state database, filed October 14, labels the July JEGE gift "JEGE, Inc.", and the campaign's refund list uses the same two names.

August 27 to September 1 · $10,400 through two entities

Two days after Epstein's "10 4" instruction, JEGE, LLC wrote check #1037 for $5,200 to "Gary King for Governor," drawn on Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas and signed "Darren Indyke" on the authorized-signature line. The bank's processing stamps read September 5 and September 8 (EFTA01348584, page image).

The campaign's First General report, covering through September 1, records two contributions dated September 1 on Form B1 (Scribd; the same rows appear in dataset 392).

9/1/2014 JEGE, LLC - 6100 Red Hook Quarter B3, St Thomas VI 00802 … $5,200.00
9/1/2014 Maple, Inc - 6100 Red Hook Quarter suite B-3, St Thomas VI 00802 … $5,200.00

Two entities. $10,400. Nothing else from any Epstein-linked source is recorded between August 25 and the flight.

Earlier coverage could not see the match because NM Political Report gave Maple's contribution as $5,000 rather than $5,200. The campaign's own filing, the state database, and the Santa Fe New Mexican's original September 9, 2014 tally all say $5,200.

September 5 · The campaign pays the full fare

The Second General report, submitted October 14 and covering September 2 through October 6 (Scribd, Form C), lists one payment to the operator.

9/5/2014 Injet - 4145 Southern, Coral Gables FL 00000 … private plane … $22,060.90

That is the quoted fare to the cent, reported paid by the campaign three days before departure and four days before the first story about the donors. The full-fare payment was not a reaction to press coverage.

September 8 · The flight

Kahn checked in with Khoury at 8:25 am. "please confirm that everything is in order for flight tonight." Khoury: "We should be all set." Kahn: "have a good trip and thanks for your help coordinating." Khoury: "Thank you for all of your help" (EFTA00363159). Kahn had forwarded the operator's trip sheet to Khoury the night before with the note "Peter please communicate directly with Chris" (EFTA00363574). An assistant emailed Epstein a reminder that morning, "Gary King to take charter tonight from Sante fe to Washington" (EFTA00363588).

The trip sheet names the client as Jege LLC, the contact as Larry Visoski, and the aircraft as a Hawker 800XP, N225RP, departing Santa Fe Municipal at 8:00 pm MDT and arriving Dulles at 1:16 am EDT. The passenger manifest lists Gary King, Deb Haaland, Chris Khoury, and two other campaign staffers (EFTA00310528).

VI. The arithmetic

Epstein's message preceded the written quote by sixteen minutes, and the broker had told Visoski on August 22 that "we can do it for about $22K with all taxes and fees included" (EFTA00364053 p.4), so the figures he used were round ones for a fare of about $22,000. The sum of his two numbers is $22,000; the fare came in at $22,060.90, a gap of $60.90. Read on its own terms, the message proposes that King's side bear roughly $11,600 and that Epstein's side put in $10,400 through two companies. What the filings then show is two contributions totaling exactly $10,400 from two of his companies, recorded one week before the flight, and the campaign paying the operator everything.

That is consistent with the split Epstein described. It does not establish that the contributions were made or received as fare money. No campaign email says so, and none in the DOJ release discusses the contributions at all. Khoury coordinated the flight with Kahn, and the corporations letter directed questions to Khoury. The records do not show that he, or anyone else at the campaign, linked the September contributions to the charter. The Journal's readers saw the email in February. The coverage reviewed for this report did not place the filings beside it.

VII. After the story

September 9 and 10 · The New Mexican, then the AP calls St. Thomas

On September 9 the Santa Fe New Mexican reported that companies at Epstein's Virgin Islands address had given King "more than $35,000", itemizing six companies whose gifts total $35,600, a story Deutsche Bank later filed as negative media in its own review of JEGE (EFTA01296377 pp.2–3). The Associated Press called Epstein's Virgin Islands office the same day. The message reached Epstein through Cecile de Jongh, the wife of the sitting governor of the Virgin Islands and the manager of Epstein's local companies (see the Plaskett investigation). "Barry Massey from the AP called here for you yesterday re Gary King. We just took a message" (EFTA00630939). The AP story ran September 9. King's statement said his fundraising staff "missed this in the vetting process" (Santa Fe New Mexican, Sept 10, 2014).

September 12 · Seven reported refunds, and two contributions untouched

The Second General report lists seven "Refunded Contribution" entries, all dated September 12, 2014, for Maple $5,200; JEGE, LLC $5,200; FT RealEstate $5,000; Laurel $5,000; Nautilus $5,000; JEGE, Inc. $5,000; and Neptune $5,200 (Scribd, Form C). They total $35,600. The corpus holds one of the physical checks. "Gary King 2014" check #1631 to Laurel, Inc., $5,000, is dated 9-12-14 and carries Gary King's signature (EFTA01271585 p.190, page image).

In the Second and Third General reports, the two later 2014 filings examined for this report (Scribd, Oct 30), no refund to Darren Indyke or to HBRK Associates appears. The state database records contributions only and cannot show refunds. King's public pledge, as quoted by the Santa Fe New Mexican on September 10, 2014, covered "the companies in question." The $10,400 from Epstein's lawyer and Epstein's accountant, given in the same June week the corporations letter went out, is not among the reported refunds.

The 2014 total from Epstein's circle was therefore $46,000 rather than the $35,600 reported at the time. It came in nine contributions, eight from entities (seven from the Red Hook companies, counting JEGE's July and September gifts separately, plus HBRK Associates) and one from Indyke personally.

October 27 · Laurel deposits King's check

Laurel, Inc. deposited King's September 12 refund on October 27, six weeks later, at First Bank Virgin Islands (EFTA01271585 pp.189–190). Whether the other six refund checks were deposited is not visible in the corpus.

VIII. What a bank and a prosecutor wrote down

None of what follows is King's email, and none of it accuses him of anything. It is what two institutions recorded about Epstein between 2017 and 2020, in which King's name is the identifying fact.

June 15, 2017 · The only negative media on JEGE is the King story

Deutsche Bank's private wealth research unit ran due diligence on JEGE, LLC, the company that had chartered King's plane and written his campaign two checks. The screening result was "Auto-Closed No-Hit" on the bank's watchlist searches. Under "Negative Media" the form records a result found and points to an attachment. The attachment, reproduced in full inside the file, is Steve Terrell's Santa Fe New Mexican story of September 9, 2014, "King donors' address linked to sex offender" (EFTA01296377). The bank ran the same check on Neptune, LLC, which had given King $5,200 in June 2014, and logged it "Not Alerted," with the same Terrell story attached (EFTA01296884).

In other words, the only adverse press the bank could find on two of Epstein's companies, three years after the fact, was that they had given money to Gary King.

The know your customer file · Neptune is identified by its King donation

A Deutsche Bank global know your customer form for the Epstein relationship carries this note under Neptune:

Neptune LLC owned by Jeffrey Epstein donated to Gary King's campaign for $5,200 in 2006. Mr. Epstein is already noted as a PEP (EFTA01362390)

The bank's year is wrong. Neptune's $5,200 check to King is dated June 17, 2014 and is in the corpus as a page image (EFTA01348769). What matters is not the error but the use: inside the bank's own files, the fact that identifies this shell company is a contribution to a New Mexico politician.

September 12, 2019 · Deutsche Bank tells prosecutors which companies are Epstein's

Two months after Epstein's arrest, Deutsche Bank made a presentation to the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, marked confidential under the federal grand jury rule (EFTA01681865). Exhibit O lists payments to Epstein-affiliated people and companies that the bank had not itself taken on as clients, and explains, entity by entity, why it believed each one was his. For four of them the explanation is the money they gave Gary King.

Every payment listed runs through First Bank of Puerto Rico from an account in Jeffrey Epstein's name. The seven rows total $16,543,277. The exhibit's footnote for the King reference cites Terrell's story again, the same one the bank's researchers had pulled in 2017 (EFTA01681865 pp.33-34, Bates EFTA01681898 and EFTA01681899, page images checked).

The bank did not say these companies were Epstein's because they gave to King. It said they appeared to be his, and gave two identifying facts: the shared Virgin Islands address, and the King contributions. On the same page the bank describes Cypress Inc., nine payments totaling $1,025,000, as "a holding company associated with Epstein's New Mexican property, the Zorro Ranch."

February 14, 2020 · "Gary w/2 King" on the privilege list

When prosecutors screened the Epstein material for attorney-client privilege, they ran a list of law firm names, lawyer names and email domains against 1,189,846 documents. The report is titled "Privilege Terms_02.14.2020" (EFTA00099346).

The report's columns, as printed, are "Documents with hits," "Documents with hits, including Family," and "Unique hits." The term Gary w/2 King, meaning those two words within two words of each other, returned 151, 302 and 147. The law firm term "Gary King Law" returned zero, zero and zero.

On the same list sit the New Mexico lawyers who did Epstein's state work: "Rothstein Donatelli" and the domain rothsteinlaw.com, which is Schoenburg's firm; "Sutin Thayer & Brown"; and the Santa Fe firm "Katz Herdman MacGillivray & Fullerton," whose letterhead in the corpus gives a Santa Fe post office box (EFTA01349431).

A privilege term is a screening instruction, not an accusation, and a term can be added for many reasons. What the document shows is that in February 2020 the government was treating "Gary King" as a name worth screening in the same pass as Epstein's New Mexico counsel.

Searching the twelve articles fetched for this report, we were not able to find any mention of Deutsche Bank's files on the Epstein companies, of its September 2019 presentation, or of the privilege term.

IX. The lease file and the cousin

The attorney general was not the only King in Epstein's New Mexico paperwork. Jerry King was Bruce King's nephew, which makes him the attorney general's cousin, and from about 2003 he was an assistant commissioner at the New Mexico State Land Office. The Santa Fe New Mexican reported in 2026 that he "appears to have been a point person for Epstein's staff in public land dealings," citing a 2004 land office letter in the Justice Department files.

The file that letter comes from is longer than the quotation, and it runs in one direction.

Zorro Ranch sits beside state trust land. Epstein's Zorro Trust held state agricultural lease GR-2122, and the land office administered it. In the spring of 2004 the office looked into machinery working near two petroglyph sites inside the ranch. The inspection memorandum of March 2, 2004 is addressed TO: JERRY KING, ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER, from the Santa Fe district officer.

David Eck and myself inspected the subject property in response to a report of heavy machinery located either on or very near to state trust land at the Comanche Gap and Creston petroglyph panel sites within the Zorro Ranch. ... According to the ranch hand that escorted us to and from the property, a level pad site was prepared so that a caboose can be placed on a short section of railroad tracks for whatever reason the lessee might have. (EFTA01305252 p.322, Bates EFTA01305574)

The memorandum recommends that "the lessee be informed that the site might encumber state trust land and reminded that permission is needed from the Commissioner prior to placing improvements." Its second page records something else about working on this particular ranch.

what is disconcerting is that a ranch escort is needed for personnel from this office to access cultural sites for general administrative fieldwork and/or educational uses. (EFTA01305252 p.323)

Epstein's side then applied for permission after the work, on March 25. A follow-up memorandum of April 22, again addressed to Jerry King, records where the inquiry had come from in the first place.

As per your direction, the attached special assignment (MJG-SA-305 dated March 2, 2004) was previously filed in regard to your report of heavy machinery possibly working on or near to state trust land within the subject ranch unit. (EFTA01305252 p.321)

In June the office wrote to Zorro Trust, care of Jeffrey E. Epstein at 457 Madison Avenue.

Please find enclosed an approved copy of your improvement application. Note that the Commissioner has chosen to grant you 25% of the value for the improvement. ... If you have any questions please contact me at [redacted] or Jerry King, Assistant Commissioner at [redacted]. (EFTA01305252 p.307, Bates EFTA01305559)

The follow-up memorandum describes the inspection as filed "as per your direction" and in regard to "your report" of heavy machinery, and Jerry King is the "you" it is addressed to. Whether he first spotted the machinery or the report reached the office through him, the file does not say. What it does show is the routing: the inquiry ran through Jerry King, the inspection memorandum was addressed to him, the application filed after the work was approved, and the approval letter gave Epstein his telephone number.

The conflict on the face of that file is a matter of public record, and it was raised in New Mexico five years later for other reasons. NMPolitics.net reported in September 2009 that Jerry King, then an assistant commissioner handling "special projects," had filed a disclosure form dated January 1, 2003 stating "that he is a partner and shareholder in King Land & Cattle Co. and Pine Canyon Ranch Corp., which both have state land leases, and that his father holds land leases through the company King Bros. Ranch." A handwritten note on the form reads, "I will avoid any conflict that may arise."

Two of those three companies are the sellers of Zorro Ranch. The 1993 purchase agreement in the corpus names the seller as "King Brothers Ranch, a New Mexico general partnership, King Land & Cattle Company, a New Mexico general partnership, and Pine Canyon Ranch, Inc., a New Mexico corporation," with Zorro Trust as purchaser and a closing in early March 1993 (EFTA01305252 p.414). The ranch and its state leases were sold by companies in which the land office's assistant commissioner held a disclosed interest, and he then sat on the state's file for the lease that came with it.

The family's physical footprint stayed on the property after the sale. Epstein's own weekly ranch reports record it. In June 2002: "Godec agreed to easment. King agreed to easement" (EFTA00582110). In September 2002, on the choice between two water system quotes: "This pipe line was installed by the Kings and has the following problems: a. The line is not buried below the frost line resulting in pipes bursting during winter" (EFTA00578393 p.5). Neither entry says which King.

What the file does not show is favoritism. Whether a 25 percent improvement valuation was ordinary for a non-ranching structure in 2004, and whether Jerry King recused himself from anything, are not answerable from these pages. The land office would know. The conflict is documented. The conduct is not.

For the ranch itself, the 1993 sale, and the King family's role in it, see the Zorro Ranch investigation, part 2.

X. What King has said, and what the documents show

Haaland's spokesperson told ICT in February 2026 that "Deb never had any interaction with him and the way in which the plane was chartered was never communicated to her." In the documents reviewed for this report, Haaland's name appears only on the trip sheet. That record neither corroborates nor contradicts the statement.

King is now president of the New Mexico Children's Foundation, according to the foundation's own board listing and to Reuters.

Fairness note. King, Khoury, Kahn, Indyke, Haaland and Jerry King were not contacted for this report. Their prior public statements are quoted above. None of them has been asked about the 2004 contributions, the August 2010 sequence, the bank and prosecution records in Part VIII, the land office file in Part IX, or the comparison in Part VI.

XI. What is missing

• The Maple check. JEGE's $5,200 check is in the corpus. Maple's $5,200 check, recorded the same day, is not. Maple's bank records would show the date it was written.
• Whether the other six refunds cleared, and whether Indyke or HBRK were ever refunded. Only Laurel's deposit is in the corpus, and only the 2014 filings through October 30 were examined. Deutsche Bank and First Bank statements for JEGE, Maple, Neptune, FT Real Estate and Nautilus for October through December 2014, and the campaign's 2015 filings, would settle both questions.
• The campaign's understanding. No campaign email about the charter is in the DOJ release beyond Khoury's replies to Kahn. Whether anyone at the campaign treated the September 1 contributions as connected to the fare is unknown.
• The state office. Why Epstein's assistant circulated the attorney general's Villagra Building address, rather than the campaign's, is not explained in any document.
• The aircraft and the briefing. Who owned N225RP, and what King and Haaland were told about who had arranged the charter, are not in the record.
• The sheriff's file. Epstein's own lawyers say he registered with the Santa Fe County Sheriff in 2010. The registration form, its date, and any log of his visits to the county are not in the DOJ release. A county records request would show when he first appeared and what he declared.
• How the registry decision was made. The Department of Public Safety's internal file for July 23 to August 19, 2010, including anything to or from the attorney general's office, is not in the release. A federal judge asked Epstein's defense for the application materials in 2019 and was told nothing. This is the one record that could move the 2010 section in either direction.
• The 2006 refund. King said in August 2006 that he planned to return Epstein's $15,000, and told Reuters in 2026 that he did not. His attorney general committee's reports for September through November 2006 would settle it.
• The 1993 deeds. The purchase agreement names three selling companies. Which family members signed the recorded deeds is not in the corpus and would come from the Santa Fe County Clerk.
• Whether 25 percent was standard. The land office granted Epstein 25 percent of the value of an unauthorized improvement. Whether that was ordinary, and whether Jerry King recused himself from the file, are questions for the State Land Office.
• Later contacts. Nine and ten days after the story, an unidentified "Jim Noel" was calling Epstein's office about King, the second message copied to Indyke, and someone using a different number called him back (EFTA00362315, EFTA00362357). His identity is unknown.

Corroboration scorecard

Timeline

Source key

Corpus, 2014 charter and money: EFTA00364267; EFTA00650515; EFTA00995439; EFTA00364043; EFTA00364041; EFTA00364038; EFTA00364053; EFTA00363574; EFTA00363588; EFTA00363159; EFTA00310528; EFTA00870192; EFTA00368519; EFTA00368401; EFTA00368431; EFTA00304889; EFTA00367846; EFTA00367856; EFTA00630939; EFTA00362315; EFTA00362357; EFTA01348584; EFTA01348769; EFTA01271585.

Corpus, 2010 registry file and trips: EFTA00728275; EFTA00727954; EFTA00730001; EFTA00731095; EFTA00779086; EFTA00895604; EFTA00757727; EFTA02422860; EFTA00779059; EFTA00727403; EFTA01147516; EFTA00039383. Passenger manifests: HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_006120; 006119; 006118; 006117; 006116; 006115 (page images).

Corpus, institutions and land office: EFTA01296377; EFTA01296884; EFTA01362390; EFTA01681865 (Bates EFTA01681898 and EFTA01681899, page images); EFTA00099346; EFTA01349431; EFTA01305252; EFTA00582110; EFTA00578393; EFTA01661603.

Federal filings: King for Congress, FEC committee C00393702, original quarterly reports 127614 (May 13 to June 30, 2004) and 140986 (July 1 to September 30, 2004), Schedule A, with the amendment 154878 (filed December 2, 2004) and the FEC's itemized receipts viewer for the October report.

State and public records: New Mexico campaign finance filings for "Gary King 2014" (Fourth Primary, submitted July 3, 2014; First General, September 8; Second General, October 14; Third General, October 30), as uploaded to Scribd by NM Telegram in 2014; The Accountability Project, dataset 392, New Mexico campaign contributions 2000–2021; New Mexico Department of Justice contact page; New Mexico Children's Foundation board listing; LittleSis entity 44872; Wikipedia, 2014 New Mexico gubernatorial election (primary date) and Gary King (politician) (offices and the 2010 reelection).

Press: NMPolitics.net (Heath Haussamen), Sept 7, 2009; Santa Fe New Mexican, Aug 16, 2006 (reproduced at EFTA01661603) and Sept 9, 2014 and Sept 10, 2014; Associated Press, Sept 9, 2014 (the AP caller is named as Barry Massey in EFTA00630939); The Daily Beast (Kate Briquelet), Apr 16, 2019; NM Political Report, Feb 17 and Feb 23, 2026; Albuquerque Journal (Matthew Reisen), Feb 17, 2026; ICT (Pauly Denetclaw), Feb 19, 2026; KOB, Feb 19 and Feb 28, 2026; Reuters (Andrew Hay), Mar 21, 2026; Santa Fe New Mexican, "Jeffrey Epstein maintained ties to New Mexico's prominent King family for years," 2026.

Report compiled September 3, 2026 and expanded September 4, 2026. Fifty three quotations from corpus documents were checked line by line against the document text. Three more, where the scanned text is unreliable, were read from the page image instead: the JPMorgan summary in Part I, and the August 26 message in Part II. Page images were also pulled for the three 2014 checks, the key 2014 emails, the two 2010 passenger manifests quoted here, and both pages of the Deutsche Bank exhibit. The 2004 contributions were read from the campaign's own electronic filings with the Federal Election Commission and checked against the Commission's itemized receipts viewer. All eighty one external links were fetched and checked on September 4, 2026.