Epstein Data Wiki

Unsealing Decisions in the Epstein Proceedings

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tagstopic, unsealing, sealed-records, courts, southern-district-of-florida, southern-district-of-new-york, palm-beach

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ProceedingsJane Doe #1 and Jane Doe #2 v. United States, No. 08-80736-CIV-MARRA (S.D. Fla.)1; State of Florida v. Jeffrey Epstein, Nos. 502006CF009454 and 502008CF009381 (Fla. 15th Judicial Circuit, Palm Beach County), on review as Epstein v. State, No. 4D09-2554 (Fla. 4th DCA)23; Giuffre v. Maxwell, No. 15 Civ. 7433 (S.D.N.Y.)45; In re Application to Unseal Civil Discovery Materials, USAO Reference No. 2018R01618, No. 19-MC-00179 (S.D.N.Y.)67
Judges who decidedKenneth A. Marra, United States District Judge, Southern District of Florida89; Jeffrey J. Colbath, Circuit Court Judge, Fifteenth Judicial Circuit210; Robert W. Sweet, Loretta A. Preska and Sarah Netburn, Southern District of New York457
First application recorded hereSeptember 25, 2008: two pseudonymous crime victims moved to unseal the non-prosecution agreement1
The Government as applicantFebruary 5, 2019: an Assistant United States Attorney applied under the All Writs Act for an order releasing a law firm from a protective order so that it could answer a grand jury subpoena6
Applications refusedThe victims’ motion, February 12, 20098; Epstein’s motions to keep the state records confidential and to stay their disclosure, June 25 and 26, 2009210; the Government’s application in a parallel New York civil case7; Ghislaine Maxwell’s request to reconsider, July 29, 20205
Applications grantedTwo non-parties’ and a newspaper’s state-court motions, June 25, 20092; the petitioners’ two motions to open the federal file, June 18, 2013911
A ruling stayedJuly 1, 2009: the Fourth District Court of Appeal stayed the state unsealing order the day before the clerk was to release the papers3

Between 2008 and 2022 five named judges, sitting in three trial courts, decided on named applications which parts of the sealed Epstein record the public would be allowed to read, and a state appellate court stopped one of those decisions taking effect. This page sets those decisions out in order: who applied, what for, what the court held, and when. The same instrument was fought over on different terms in each forum. In the federal victims’ litigation the Government resisted unsealing on the ground that the document had never been sealed there at all; in the state criminal court the objection came from Epstein himself and the applicants were two non-parties and a newspaper; and in New York the applicant on one occasion was the Government, asking to be let at material that a protective order in a private lawsuit was keeping from it.

For the appellate unsealing of the Giuffre v. Maxwell summary judgment record in 2019 and the redaction practice in the Maxwell prosecution, see Redacted filings. For the July 2015 privilege order and the Table appended to it, see Operation Leap Year and Doe v. United States.

The victims’ motion, and the answer that there was nothing to unseal

On September 25, 2008 the two pseudonymous petitioners in the Crime Victims’ Rights Act case in the Southern District of Florida filed Document 28, headed “VICTIM’S MOTION TO UNSEAL NON-PROSECUTION AGREEMENT”. The agreement had been produced to their lawyers under the protective order the court entered on August 21, 2008. The motion gave three reasons for lifting the restriction: that “no good cause exists for sealing it”; that “the Government has inaccurately described the agreement in its publicly-filed pleadings, creating a false impression that the agreement protects the victims”; and that it should be unsealed “to facilitate consultation by victims’ counsel with others involved who have information related to the case.”1 Counsel lodged a proposed order with the motion, headed “ORDER TO UNSEAL NON-PROSECUTION AGREEMENT” and reciting that the motion “is GRANTED”. Its date line is blank and its signature line is empty. It was never entered.12

The United States opposed on October 8, 2008. Its first heading was a jurisdictional point rather than a defence of secrecy: “THE MOTION TO UNSEAL SHOULD BE DENIED BECAUSE THE NON-PROSECUTION AGREEMENT HAS NEVER BEEN FILED UNDER SEAL IN THIS COURT.” The agreement, the opposition said, “was never filed in the instant case by the United States, either under seal or otherwise”; the parties who negotiated it “determined that the Agreement should remain confidential”, and “[t]hey were free to do so, and violated no law in making such an agreement.” What the petitioners were really seeking, it argued, was modification of the August 21, 2008 protective order, and they lacked both an injury in fact and standing to challenge a confidentiality clause in somebody else’s contract. It ended: “First, there is no sealing order.”13 The filing was submitted for R. Alexander Acosta, United States Attorney, over the electronic signature of Assistant U.S. Attorney Dexter A. Lee.13

The petitioners replied on October 16, 2008 and accepted the Government’s framing in a footnote, while disputing where the burden lay: “The Government prefers to view the issues in this case as involving not the sealing of a document but rather the entry of a protective order preventing the disclosure of a document. To simplify the dispute in this case, we will proceed on the Government’s view of the situation.” On the merits they wrote that the argument had “things backwards”, because “it is not the victims’ task to show some reason for not entering a protective order; rather, it is the Government’s task to show some affirmative reason for entering the order in the first place.” They noted that Epstein had been served with the motion and had not responded.14

Judge Kenneth A. Marra denied the motion in an order docketed February 12, 2009. He took the Government’s point first: “as Respondent points out, the Agreement was not filed in this case, under seal or otherwise.” As to the alleged mischaracterisations, he held that if and when they became relevant to an issue he had to decide, the parties would be heard and “[i]f disclosure of the Agreement will be required for the Court to resolve the issue, appropriate disclosure will be ordered.” As to modifying the restrictions, the petitioners had not met their burden: “Petitioners’ mere desire to discuss the Agreement with third parties is insufficient, in and of itself, to warrant the granting of such relief.” A specific tangible need, if it arose in one of the victims’ civil suits, should be raised in that case. The motion was denied.8 The order’s own date line reads “this 12th day of February, 2008”, a year earlier than the docket stamp; Epstein’s counsel later noted the slip in a footnote to a state appellate filing, writing that “[t]he order is mistakenly dated February 12, 2008.”15

Palm Beach County, 2009: the state leg

The agreement and its addendum had also been lodged, under seal, in Epstein’s state criminal case. He had pleaded guilty in the Circuit Court for Palm Beach County on June 30, 2008 before Judge Deborah Dale Pucillo, who directed that a sealed copy of the federal agreement be filed; an agreed order sealing the document followed on July 2, 2008, and the addendum was filed under seal on August 25, 2008.1615

On May 12, 2009 a non-party filed a motion in the criminal case to vacate that order and unseal both documents, under Florida Rule of Judicial Administration 2.420(d)(5). The motion is brought by initials only. It states that the movant was a victim of the defendant’s offences and had a civil action against him then pending in the same court, and its substantive complaint is procedural: the sealing had been done without the written motion the rule requires, without the notice to the public, the media, the record newspaper and the victims that the rule requires, without the findings the rule requires, and without the clerk posting the notice the rule requires.17 On June 1, 2009 Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc., publisher of the Palm Beach Post, moved to intervene “for the limited purpose of seeking access to documents filed under seal”, making the same procedural objection and adding that “continued sealing of these documents is pointless, because these documents have been discussed repeatedly in open court records.”18 A second non-party, also identified by initials, moved on June 11 to intervene and for an order unsealing the records.15 Epstein moved the same day, under the same rule of judicial administration, “to treat as confidential” the two documents.16

Judge Jeffrey J. Colbath heard all four applications on June 25, 2009 and ruled from the bench, the order recording that counsel for Epstein, for the newspaper, for the two non-parties and for the State were present and that “[n]o appearance was filed on behalf of the United States.” His findings were short. “At the time the State court took these matters under seal, the proper procedure for sealing such documents had not been followed.” Neither the State, nor the United States, nor Epstein “have presented sufficient evidence to warrant the sealing of documents currently held by the Court”. The motions to seal were denied, the motions to intervene granted, and “[t]he Motion to unseal the documents is granted.” Two riders followed. The originals would not be disclosed; instead the judge would inspect them in camera and “redact the names of the underage victims, if any, so their identity will be indicated by their initials”. And the order “is in no way to be interpreted as permission to not comply with U.S. District Court Kenneth Marra’s previous Orders.” Disclosure was stayed until the next morning so that Epstein’s motion to stay could be heard.2

It was heard on June 26 and denied. Judge Colbath set the release for noon on Thursday, July 2, and said why he had left a gap: “It is the intent of the Court to give the Defendant, Mr. Epstein, and his attorney an opportunity to have this Court’s orders reviewed by the 4th DCA. If the Clerk gets no direction from the Appellate Court, she shall disclose the documents on the date referred to above.”10

Epstein used the gap. On June 30 his appellate counsel hand-delivered to Judge Colbath a copy of an emergency petition for certiorari, an emergency motion to review the denial of the stay, a motion to use one appendix and a motion to file the agreement and addendum under seal, all filed in the Fourth District Court of Appeal.15 His filings argued that the Florida confidentiality rule the movants relied on does not apply to criminal cases, that the administrative order they cited post-dated the sealing, and that “the United States Attorney’s Office has a compelling interest in having the confidentiality provision of its contract with Mr. Epstein honored.” They also placed weight on the federal orders: the motion to file the two documents under seal in the appellate court states that “Federal District Judge Marra has twice ordered the documents not disclosed to third parties.”15

The Fourth District ruled on July 1, 2009, the day before the clerk was to hand the papers over. Its order granted the motion to file under seal, granted the motion to use one appendix, and granted “petitioner’s Emergency Motion to Review the Order June 26, 2009, that denies the motion for stay. The June 25, 2009, order granting the motion to unseal is stayed pending further order of this court.” The respondents were given ten days to show cause why the petition should not be granted, and were directed to address the court’s jurisdiction as well as the merits.3 The searches described below did not return an order of that court disposing of the petition.

June 18, 2013: the federal file is opened instead

Four and a half years after refusing the victims’ motion, Judge Marra opened the federal file by a different route, on two motions decided the same day.

The first was procedural. The Government had filed its memorandum in support of its motion to dismiss, its reply, and its motion to stay discovery under seal, relying on grand jury secrecy under Rule 6(e) and on a sealed 2011 order of another judge permitting limited disclosure of grand jury matters in the proceeding. Judge Marra held that “[t]he government’s insertion of passing references to this material in its pleadings before this court does not justify the government’s wholesale submission of these filings under seal”, and that redaction was “a less onerous alternative to sealing”. He granted the petitioners’ motion, gave the Government ten days to redact the grand jury references and the identity of the crime victims “by name or initial” and to re-file in the public court file, and directed the Clerk to unseal and place in the public file the Government’s own opposition to that motion, “which submission contains no descriptive references to the grand jury material in question.”9

The second was the privilege ruling. Epstein and three of his lawyers had intervened to keep the correspondence between his counsel and the U.S. Attorney’s Office under seal, asserting opinion work product, grand jury secrecy, the plea-statement rules, irrelevance, and an invitation to the court to create a new federal common law privilege for plea discussions. Judge Marra rejected each, holding among other things that any work product protection “was necessarily forfeited when Epstein voluntarily submitted the information to the United States Attorney’s Office in the hopes of receiving the quid pro quo of lenient punishment”, and declining “to recognize a new federal common law privilege over plea discussions as here urged by the intervenors.” He granted the motion to unseal the unredacted pleadings incorporating the correspondence “with the following proviso”: the petitioners were to review each page and redact victims’ names or initials, government telephone and email details, references to individuals other than Epstein relating to uncharged crimes, and correspondence describing or attaching grand jury subpoenas. The intervenors’ motions for a protective order were denied.11 The privilege holdings themselves, and the far larger Table of rulings that followed in July 2015, are set out at Operation Leap Year and Doe v. United States.

2016: an opinion whose own redaction was put to the parties

Giuffre v. Maxwell produced a decision that is not a ruling about sealed documents but a ruling that was itself treated as one. Virginia Giuffre had moved to compel Ghislaine Maxwell to produce material withheld on attorney-client, attorney-client-agent and common interest privilege grounds; the defendant had withheld ninety-nine pages of emails. Judge Robert W. Sweet held that in camera review was warranted, took further submissions, and issued an opinion granting the motion in part and denying it in part, working through the withheld chains one by one and ordering most of them produced.4

The last paragraph is the one that concerns this page. “This matter being subject to a Protective Order dated March 17, 2016, the parties are directed to meet and confer regarding redactions to this Opinion consistent with that Order. The parties are further directed to jointly file a proposed redacted version of this Opinion or notify the Court that none are necessary within two weeks of the date of receipt of this Opinion.” The opinion is signed by Judge Sweet and dated at New York in April 2016, the day written in by hand; the electronic filing stamp on the copy read here is May 2, 2016.4 The direction is addressed to a document the parties had not yet seen in public. It runs from “the date of receipt of this Opinion” by them, and it puts to them, not to the court, the first proposal of what in it should be blacked out.

2019 to 2021: the Government applies to unseal, and two judges disagree

On February 5, 2019 Assistant United States Attorney Alex Rossmiller, of the office of United States Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman, signed an affirmation and application under the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1651, captioned In re Application to Unseal Civil Discovery Materials, USAO Reference No. 2018R01618. It asked the Southern District of New York for “a limited order to unseal discovery materials in the possession of Boies Schiller & Flexner LLP” in the civil action No. 15 Civ. 7433 (RWS), which was subject to a protective order the court had entered in March 2016. Rossmiller stated that he was one of the prosecutors in charge of an ongoing investigation of Epstein and others for trafficking and enticement of minors, that “[t]he existence and scope of the Investigation in this district is not publicly known”, and that premature disclosure “could alert potential criminal targets that they are under investigation, causing them to destroy evidence, flee from prosecution, or otherwise seriously jeopardize the Investigation.” A grand jury subpoena had already been served on the firm, which was willing to comply but considered itself barred by the protective order. The application was made ex parte and asked that it and any resulting order be sealed.6

The proposed order lodged with it bears the name of Judge Robert W. Sweet, an empty signature line and the date “February __, 2019”. Its recitals describe the protective order as the one “issued on March 18, 2016” in the case; its operative sentence releases the firm from “the November 29, 2018 protective order”, which is a different order in a different case. Both dates are in the same two-page draft.6

On April 16, 2019 the courtroom deputy to Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn circulated a message with the subject line “In re Application to Unseal Civil Discovery Materials SDNY 19-mc-00179”, saying: “Please see the attached PDF for an Order that was filed under seal today in 19-mc-179.” The attachment is named for a stamped sealed order of April 15.19

The text of a sealed order in that miscellaneous case, published later as a slip opinion, is a denial. Magistrate Judge Netburn recorded that the United States Attorney had moved under the All Writs Act for an order relieving the same law firm of its obligations under a protective order of November 29, 2018 in a different civil suit against Epstein, No. 17-CV-616 (JGK)(SN), so that it could answer a grand jury subpoena. She held that the court had power to modify the order but declined to exercise it. Under Second Circuit authority a court must find either that the protective order was improvidently granted or that the Government has shown exceptional circumstances or a compelling need, and the Government had shown neither: it “has not offered any affirmations or facts suggesting that the evidence in the Law Firm’s possession cannot be obtained from other sources without compromising the investigation. Instead, it relies on the general desire for secrecy.” She added that “the extraordinary posture of the case requires the Court to police carefully government intrusions into areas of protections agreed to by civil litigants and so-ordered by the Court”, and that the Government “is attempting to side-step these protections by serving a subpoena only upon a party who is willing (and perhaps eager) to comply”. The motion was denied without prejudice, and the order directed that it and everything else in the miscellaneous case “will remain UNDER SEAL until further Court Order.”7

The order also records that the same application had been made elsewhere and had succeeded: “In response to an identical application seeking to modify a protective order in a different case between Epstein and an alleged victim, another judge in this District has reached a different conclusion. That judge found that Epstein’s reliance on the protective order in that case was not reasonable, and therefore modified its terms to allow the Law Firm to respond to the grand jury subpoena. I reach a different conclusion.”7

On the morning of March 30, 2021 a lawyer in the United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia forwarded a Westlaw alert carrying that item to a colleague in the Southern District of New York with the line: “This is weird to me. The order says it is sealed, but it’s quite public, as you can see.” The colleague forwarded it on, asking “Do you know what this is about?” The answer came back within a quarter of an hour, from within the office that had made the application: “This is a 2019 order that was recently unsealed. We made an application to modify a protective order in a civil case, and Judge Netburn denied the application.”2021

July 2019: the Government asks to unseal its own indictment

The office made a third kind of unsealing application that year, for a document of its own. On the Sunday evening of July 7, 2019, the day after Epstein’s arrest, an Assistant United States Attorney wrote to a magistrate judge to give notice of “our expected application tomorrow morning to unseal Indictment 19 Cr. 490, United States v. Jeffrey Epstein, and to have a district judge assigned to the case (from Wheel C)”, attaching a copy of the application and proposed order in advance and warning that “we expect there may be significant press and public attention and attendance at a proceeding before your honor.”22 The next morning a colleague confirmed that a meeting had been arranged “to unseal and wheel”, against a request from another quarter to “please present unsealing order at your earliest”.23 The order unsealing the indictment, and the proceedings that followed, are at the SDNY 2019 indictment.

November 2022: unsealing one document at a time

The last decision recorded here is the one that shows what a document-by-document review actually looks like. At a conference on November 18, 2022 in Giuffre v. Maxwell, held by Microsoft Teams before Judge Loretta A. Preska with counsel for the plaintiff, for an individual intervenor and the Miami Herald Media Company, and for one objecting non-party, the court went through the sealed docket entries in turn, giving a ruling and a reason for each and grouping them by which non-party objected.24

The reasons cut both ways. The motion to unseal was denied as to one non-party because that person was “a classic outsider, peripheral to the events at issue”, was “neither a victim nor associated with Epstein or Maxwell”, played “no apparent role in Judge Sweet’s ruling on the discovery motion to which this document was attached”, and was not mentioned at the criminal trial. It was granted as to another who had objected that unsealing would connect that person with the case and invade their privacy, the court holding that “generalized concerns of adverse publicity do not outweigh the presumption of public access”. Personal contact information in the documents to be released “should be excluded from the production”, and one stretch of one deposition transcript, identified by page and line, was to “remain sealed because it contains sensitive medical information”. At the end the judge asked counsel to “confer in the manner you have in the past and prepare the documents for unsealing and posting on the docket sheet”, and reminded them that one non-party’s material was stayed for ten days so that an application could be made to the Court of Appeals.24 The appellate decision that sent this exercise back to the district court is described at Redacted filings.

Two things this page does not say

It does not report what remains sealed. Every statement above is about an application that was made and a ruling that followed. Nothing here should be read as a claim about the present state of any court file.

Pseudonymous applicants stay pseudonymous. Two of the state-court applicants in 2009, and every objecting non-party in the 2022 conference, appear in the papers under initials or under a number assigned in the litigation. This page does not reproduce those designations, does not decode them, and does not repeat any detail from which they could be worked out. The courts themselves treated the designations as the protection: Judge Colbath directed that before the state records were released he would inspect them and replace the names of underage victims with initials, and Judge Preska ordered personal contact information to stay sealed in every entry she released.224

The search run for this page

The released files were searched on the phrases “motion to unseal”, “order to unseal”, “motion to intervene and unseal”, “petition for access”, “order granting” together with “motion to unseal”, “motion to unseal is granted” and “motion to unseal is denied”, and on the appellate docket number 4D09-2554. The documents cited below were read in full, and every quotation and every signature block was checked against the page image.

Documents

DocumentDescription
EFTA02729730The whole 2008 to 2009 federal sequence in one run: the victims’ motion (Document 28) and the proposed order lodged with it, the Government’s opposition (Document 29), the reply (Document 30), and Judge Marra’s order denying the motion (Document 36)
EFTA02726432Order granting the petitioners’ motion to require the Government to file redacted pleadings publicly, and directing the Clerk to unseal the Government’s opposition, Document 187, June 18, 2013
EFTA00609955A second copy of that order
EFTA01180323Eleventh Circuit stay motion of April 24, 2014 by the intervenors, carrying at pp.36-46 the full text of Document 188, the June 18, 2013 order granting the motion to unseal the correspondence “with the following proviso”
EFTA02729643A non-party’s motion to vacate the state sealing order and unseal the records, filed May 12, 2009
EFTA02729648The Palm Beach Post’s motion to intervene and petition for access, June 1, 2009, and at p.8 the Fourth District Court of Appeal’s order of July 1, 2009 staying the unsealing
EFTA02729851Epstein’s motion to make the court records confidential and his motion to stay disclosure pending appellate review
EFTA02729597Judge Colbath’s order of June 25, 2009 granting the motions to intervene and to unseal and denying the motions to seal
EFTA00180621Epstein’s Fourth District filings as served on the trial judge, with Judge Colbath’s June 26, 2009 order denying a stay and an appendix reproducing the federal papers
EFTA01734187Judge Sweet’s opinion on the motion to compel, Document 135, directing the parties to confer on redactions to the opinion itself
EFTA01263227The Government’s sealed affirmation and application of February 5, 2019 under the All Writs Act, with the March 2016 protective order as an exhibit and an unsigned proposed order
EFTA00019579The courtroom deputy’s message of April 16, 2019 circulating a sealed order in 19-mc-00179
EFTA00032516That message forwarded on the same day
EFTA00029951The published text of the sealed order denying the Government’s application, Magistrate Judge Netburn
EFTA00029950The Westlaw alert reaching the Department on March 30, 2021, forwarded with the observation that a sealed order was “quite public”
EFTA00019095The reply from the office that made the application, identifying it and its outcome
EFTA00024875Judge Preska’s memorandum and order denying reconsideration and staying the unsealing of two deposition transcripts, Document 1079, July 29, 2020
EFTA00017070A second copy of that order
EFTA02789259 pp.11-12, 15Transcript of the conference of November 18, 2022 at which Judge Preska ruled on the sealed docket entries one by one
EFTA00028363The Government’s advance notice to chambers, July 7, 2019, of its application to unseal the indictment
EFTA00030226The following morning’s exchange arranging the unsealing

Timeline

DateEvent
June 30, 2008The agreement is ordered sealed in the state criminal case at Epstein’s plea hearing16
August 21, 2008Judge Marra’s order to compel production and protective order in the federal case13
September 25, 2008The victims move to unseal the agreement; a proposed order granting the motion is lodged with it112
October 8, 2008The Government opposes, saying the agreement was never filed under seal in that court13
October 16, 2008The victims reply, arguing the burden lies on the Government14
February 12, 2009Judge Marra denies the motion8
May 12, 2009A non-party moves in the state criminal case to vacate the sealing order17
June 1, 2009The Palm Beach Post moves to intervene and petitions for access18
June 10, 2009Judge Colbath grants the motions to intervene and defers the access questions16
June 11, 2009Epstein moves to make the records confidential; a second non-party moves to intervene16
June 25, 2009Judge Colbath denies the motions to seal and grants the motion to unseal, subject to in camera redaction of underage victims’ names2
June 26, 2009He denies a stay, setting release for noon on July 2 and leaving time for appellate review10
July 1, 2009The Fourth District Court of Appeal stays the unsealing pending further order3
June 18, 2013Judge Marra orders the Government’s sealed filings redacted and re-filed publicly, unseals its opposition, rejects the intervenors’ privilege claims and grants the motion to unseal the correspondence with a redaction proviso911
April 2016Judge Sweet signs the opinion on the motion to compel and directs the parties to confer on redactions to it; the copy read here is filed on May 24
February 5, 2019An Assistant U.S. Attorney applies under the All Writs Act to release a law firm from a protective order6
April 16, 2019Judge Netburn’s courtroom deputy circulates a sealed order filed in 19-mc-0017919
July 7 to 8, 2019The Government gives chambers advance notice of, and then makes, its application to unseal the indictment2223
July 29, 2020Judge Preska denies Maxwell’s request to reconsider the unsealing of two deposition transcripts and stays it for two business days5
March 30, 2021A Westlaw alert carrying the sealed 2019 order reaches the Department, and the office that made the application identifies it2021
November 18, 2022Judge Preska rules on the remaining sealed docket entries one by one24

Redacted filings; Doe v. United States (CVRA litigation); 2008 non-prosecution agreement; Operation Leap Year; SDNY 2019 indictment; Legal privilege and Epstein material; Discovery materials; Withheld government records; Brad Edwards; Paul G. Cassell; Alex Acosta; Ghislaine Maxwell; Virginia Giuffre; Julie K. Brown; Epstein investigations overview.

Footnotes

  1. “Victim’s Motion to Unseal Non-Prosecution Agreement”, Jane Doe #1 and Jane Doe #2 v. United States, No. 08-80736-CIV-MARRA/JOHNSON (S.D. Fla.), Document 28, entered on the docket September 25, 2008. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729730 p.1. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  2. Order of the Circuit Court of the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, Criminal Division “W”, Case Nos. 502008CF009381AXXMB and 502006CF009454AXXMB, stamped signed and dated June 25, 2009, Jeffrey J. Colbath, Circuit Court Judge. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729597 pp.1-3. Read at the page image; the typed date line is blank and the date comes from the court’s own stamp. The copy read here carries a manuscript note beside the caption reading “Delay Release until 12:00 noon July 2nd”; the hand is not identified. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7

  3. Order of the District Court of Appeal of the State of Florida, Fourth District, Case No. 4D09-2554, July 1, 2009, certified by Marilyn Beuttenmuller, Clerk. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729648 p.8. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  4. Opinion, Giuffre v. Maxwell, No. 15 Civ. 7433 (RWS) (S.D.N.Y.), Document 135, signed by Robert W. Sweet, U.S.D.J. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01734187 pp.1, 2 and 37. Read at the page image. The date line reads “April” with the day supplied in manuscript, which reads as 15; the electronic filing stamp on this copy reads May 2, 2016. This copy misspells the plaintiff’s surname in the caption and the plaintiff’s firm in the appearance block, both in the print rather than in the machine reading; the case name and the firm are given here as the court and the parties spell them elsewhere. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  5. Memorandum and Order, Giuffre v. Maxwell, No. 15 Civ. 7433 (LAP) (S.D.N.Y.), Document 1079, filed July 29, 2020, signed by Loretta A. Preska, Senior United States District Judge. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00024875 pp.1 and 4. Read at the page image. A second copy is at https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00017070 pp.1-4. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  6. “Sealed Affirmation and Application” of Assistant United States Attorney Alex Rossmiller, In re Application to Unseal Civil Discovery Materials, USAO Reference No. 2018R01618 (S.D.N.Y.), dated New York, February 5, 2019, with the March 2016 protective order annexed as Exhibit A and a proposed sealed order. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01263227 pp.1, 2, 3, 4, 11, 12 and 13. Read at the page image; the affirmation is signed and dated, and the proposed order is unsigned with the day of the month left blank. The plaintiff’s name is withheld throughout this copy and is not supplied here. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  7. In re Application to Unseal Civil Discovery Materials, USAO Reference No. 2018R01618, No. 19-MC-00179 (SN) (S.D.N.Y.), sealed order of Sarah Netburn, United States Magistrate Judge, as reported at 2021 WL 1164272. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00029951 pp.1, 2 and 3. Read at the page image. The report carries a filed date of March 24, 2021; for the order’s own date see the two messages cited in this section. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  8. Order, Document 36, entered on the docket February 12, 2009, signed by Kenneth A. Marra, United States District Judge. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729730 pp.25 and 26. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  9. “Order Granting Petitioners’ Motion to Require Government to File Redacted Pleadings in the Public Court File [DE 150]; Order Directing Clerk to Unseal the Government’s Response in Opposition to the Motion [DE 156]”, Document 187, entered June 18, 2013, signed by Kenneth A. Marra. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02726432 pp.1, 3 and 4. Read at the page image. A second copy is at https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00609955 pp.1-4. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  10. “Order Denying Motion to Stay Disclosure Agreement”, stamped signed and dated June 26, 2009, Jeffrey J. Colbath, Circuit Court Judge. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00180621 p.5. Read at the page image. A second copy is at https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729648 p.9. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  11. “Order Granting Petitioners’ Motion to Proffer Government Correspondence in Support of CVRA Claims & Granting Motion to Unseal Correspondence and Related Unredacted Pleadings of Petitioners”, Document 188, entered June 18, 2013, signed by Kenneth Marra, reproduced as an exhibit to the intervenors’ Eleventh Circuit stay motion of April 24, 2014 in No. 13-12923. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA01180323 pp.36, 41, 42, 43, 45 and 46. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  12. Proposed “Order to Unseal Non-Prosecution Agreement”, Document 28-2, lodged with the motion. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729730 p.9. Read at the page image: the day and month are blank and no signature appears above the printed name. ↩ ↩2

  13. “Respondent’s Opposition to Victims’ Motion to Unseal Non-Prosecution Agreement”, Document 29, entered October 8, 2008, submitted for R. Alexander Acosta, United States Attorney, over the electronic signature of Assistant U.S. Attorney Dexter A. Lee. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729730 pp.11, 12, 14 and 16. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  14. “Victims’ Reply to Respondent’s Opposition to Victims’ Motion to Unseal Non-Prosecution Agreement”, Document 30, entered October 16, 2008. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729730 pp.18 and 19. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2

  15. Epstein’s emergency petition for writ of certiorari, emergency motion to review the denial of stay, motion to use one appendix and motion to file under seal, Epstein v. State of Florida, Fla. 4th DCA, lower tribunal case 2008 CF 009381A, with the covering letter to Judge Colbath of June 30, 2009. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00180621 pp.1, 12, 13, 19-25 and 31. Read at the page image; the footnote recording the misdating of the February 2009 federal order is at p.22. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  16. “Motion to Make Court Records Confidential”, filed for Jeffrey Epstein on June 11, 2009, which also recites the sealing on June 30 and July 2, 2008 before Judge Deborah Dale Pucillo, the earlier non-party and newspaper motions, and the court’s grant of intervention on June 10, 2009. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729851 p.6. Read at the page image. His motion to stay disclosure pending review is at pp.10-12 of the same run. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  17. “Nonparty’s Motion to Vacate Order Sealing Records and Unseal Records”, State of Florida v. Jeffrey Epstein (Fla. 15th Judicial Circuit, Palm Beach County), clerk’s filing stamp May 12, 2009. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729643 pp.1 and 2. Read at the page image. The movant’s initials, the civil-action number and the further identifying particulars on the face of the motion are not reproduced. ↩ ↩2

  18. “Palm Beach Post’s Motion to Intervene and Petition for Access”, June 1, 2009. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02729648 p.2. Read at the page image. The covering letter to chambers of the same date is at p.7 of the same run. ↩ ↩2

  19. Message from the courtroom deputy to the Hon. Sarah Netburn, United States District Court, Southern District of New York, April 16, 2019, subject “In re Application to Unseal Civil Discovery Materials SDNY 19-mc-00179”, attaching a stamped sealed order named for April 15. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00019579 p.1. Read at the page image. The same message forwarded within the Department later that day is at https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00032516 p.1. ↩ ↩2

  20. Westlaw alert forwarded within the Department of Justice, March 30, 2021, subject “Boies Schiller—Jeffrey Epstein Supposedly Sealed Order”. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00029950 p.1. Read at the page image; every correspondent name is redacted and the office suffixes are legible. ↩ ↩2

  21. Reply of March 30, 2021 on the same thread. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00019095 p.1. Read at the page image. ↩ ↩2

  22. Message to chambers, Sunday July 7, 2019, subject “RE: expected unsealing and wheel-out tomorrow”, attaching “2019-07-08,_JE,_government_unsealing_request_and_proposed_order.pdf”. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00028363 p.1. Read at the page image; the sender’s name and telephone number are redacted and the signature block reads “Assistant U.S. Attorney, Southern District of New York”. ↩ ↩2

  23. Message of Monday July 8, 2019, subject “RE: presentment of Jeffrey Epstein”, forwarding the same attachment. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA00030226 p.1. ↩ ↩2

  24. Transcript of conference before the Hon. Loretta A. Preska, Giuffre v. Maxwell, No. 15 Civ. 7433 (LAP) (S.D.N.Y.), November 18, 2022, filed as Document 1283 on December 2, 2022. https://epstein-data.com/EFTA02789259 pp.1, 11, 12 and 15. Read at the page image. The rulings are given by the number each non-party was proceeding under; those numbers are not reproduced here, and no page of this transcript other than those pinned is cited. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

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