Latest / The Vault: The Epstein Files / The Captain Of Security Operations At MCC And His OIG Deposition (Part 3) (5/31/26)
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
- 0:02Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're going to get right
- 0:06back to the Captain of Security Operations at MCC and
- 0:10his interview with the OIG inspectors. Question, all right, was
- 0:16there any discussion of placing Epstein in one of those units? Answer? No,
- 0:20Question could he have been placed in one of those units?
- 0:23Answer I'm sure he could have. Question but I mean
- 0:27by executive staff or would they had to have made
- 0:29the call to the he gets cut off by the guard.
- 0:32I believe they would have had to make special concessions
- 0:35for the inmate. Question okay. Answer They would have to
- 0:39you know, vetom and someone would have to approve it,
- 0:41I believe, outside of the executive staff at MCC. Question okay,
- 0:47and then that's where I meant by so the executive
- 0:50staff wasn't able to independently answer no, we were not.
- 0:55Question okay? Were there many inmates housed within Tense South
- 0:58at the time? Answered no. I believe at the time
- 1:01we may have had a total of four to five.
- 1:03Of course, you know, we had the notorious Joaquin Gusman
- 1:07up there. We also had the apple Puff phonetic was
- 1:10up there. We also had inmate it starts with an S.
- 1:13I can't remember his name, but basically these are inmates
- 1:17that have made crimes against the United States, which it
- 1:20was deemed that those inmates would be in that special
- 1:23management unit and they couldn't of course go to the
- 1:26general population. Question was this like a terrorist type of people? Answer?
- 1:31I would say some of them were terrorists. You know,
- 1:33of course you had Joaquin Gusman, the terrorists, the jug
- 1:37king Pin, et cetera. He could go on, he couldn't
- 1:39go on the general population. He would normally, guys like
- 1:42that would be in places where I come from before,
- 1:45you know, like Florence. He'd be at the ADX phonetic Apov.
- 1:49I believe that a Popov I think that was his name,
- 1:54a popov of or Soapopov. These guys had made terrorist
- 1:57threats against the United States, or there was guys up
- 2:00there that had material or that was found in cooperation
- 2:03with outside agencies that was trying to detriment of indiscernible
- 2:08and cause harm to the United States. These kinds of guys,
- 2:11they were put in that unit. Guys you wouldn't want
- 2:14in general population because of their recruitment value. Or their
- 2:19radical ability they could be able to do have recruitment
- 2:22value for you know, for other inmates in the general population.
- 2:26You don't want those guys in there. But Jeffrey Epstein,
- 2:28you know, he's a multi billionaire. Question sure, now, as
- 2:32far as ten south, is that one inmate per cel?
- 2:36Answer yes, question and video monitored at all times. Answer yes,
- 2:41question okay, So it's like you're a maximum security type
- 2:45answer that would be the highest security that an inmate
- 2:47at MCC would be placed in question okay, answer yeah,
- 2:52could be placed in question, but the executive team never
- 2:55discussed that. Answer no question, okay, redacted. Advice is that
- 3:00Epstein preferred not to have a cellmate and engaged in
- 3:03manipulative behavior to avoid having one. What type of behavior
- 3:08he gets cut off by the guard I believe that Epstein,
- 3:11and when he first came in, he was doing self
- 3:13manipulative behavior. You know, he was showing passive resistant activity
- 3:18as far as you know, when they're taking meals, or
- 3:21wouldn't listen to staff as far as when they're giving
- 3:23them direction. You know, he would sit in his cell
- 3:25and he wouldn't talk. You know, I believe he wasn't
- 3:28taking meals. At one point he was refusing to take
- 3:31showers things of those nature. Question and the sentence continues,
- 3:36including requesting to see a psychologist. Answer yeah, question is
- 3:40that part of it? Answer? Yes? Question okay? Did he
- 3:43say why he wanted to see a psychologist? Answer? I
- 3:46don't know. Question No answer, I don't remember that. No question. Sure,
- 3:54at Epstein's request, he was interviewed by a psychologist. Do
- 3:57you know who he made that request to have been?
- 4:00Sho staff? Answer? He probably made that request to any
- 4:04of the staff that may have been monitoring him at
- 4:06the time, because if he was placed on psychological observation
- 4:10at the time, psychological observation, you would have had to
- 4:13have staff person that sat there and monitored the inmate.
- 4:16Another inmate couldn't have done it. Question okay, and that
- 4:19is that like twenty four to seven answer? That would
- 4:22have been twenty four hours, seven days a week. Question,
- 4:25So a staff member would just sit there and watch
- 4:27him answer correct question, communicate with him or no answer? Yeah,
- 4:32of course? Question okay? Answer. I mean, and that's you know, encouraged.
- 4:38I mean, you know, even though the inmate's placed in
- 4:40that situation. Again, we're talking about humanity. Here. You know,
- 4:44you want to gauge this guy's mental acuity, meaning that
- 4:47the inmate. You want to know how he's feeling, how
- 4:49he's doing, Is he improving or is he declining, Because
- 4:53if he's declining and you can actually see it, you
- 4:56want to contact somebody. You know, if this guy is
- 4:58in there being very very no belligerent, he's being passive
- 5:01aggressive or active resistant, or displaying signs of violence, you
- 5:06want to make sure that you notify someone. You're not
- 5:08just going to sit there and allow the guy to
- 5:10do self harm to himself or a staff member when
- 5:13they come to the door to provide his services, you know,
- 5:17such as taking him to shower, providing his meals, providing
- 5:20his medication, or whatever it is. So you just don't
- 5:23want to sit there and allow the inmate just you know,
- 5:26if he's going to be detrimentally, could be a harm
- 5:29to staff or himself, you want to ensure that you
- 5:32notify someone. Question. Okay, So, following this assessment, Epstein was
- 5:36initially placed on suicide watch. He was later interviewed again
- 5:39and downgraded to psychological observation. Now, just for the suicide
- 5:44watch and psychological observation, where are they located. Answer those
- 5:49who would be conducted downstairs on the second floor in
- 5:51the health services area. Question and that's outside of the shoe.
- 5:55Correct answer, That is correct question. And that was prior
- 5:59to any attempt on his life or anything like that. Answer,
- 6:02that is correct question. Okay. After some time he was
- 6:06returned to the shoe. Redacted began hearing talk to Epstein
- 6:10was trying to get back on suicide watch. Information like
- 6:13this is usually generated from rounds, kites and kitter notes
- 6:17correct answer, correct question, and notes from inmates specifically correct answer.
- 6:22It could be yes, that could be an inmate correspondence
- 6:27question yeah, and monitoring phone calls and letters. So the
- 6:30hearing of talk that's all based upon inmate talk. Answer
- 6:34that would have been all that staff question okay, staff
- 6:38as well answer. You know staffing's sitting there, and you know,
- 6:41especially when he's on suicide watch, you know staff are
- 6:44taking notes. So it's every fifteen minutes, you know, staff is, oh,
- 6:48I'm sorry, every thirty minutes, I believe, I can't remember,
- 6:51it's been a while, but you know, a staff member
- 6:53it's every thirty minutes, I believe, is taking a log
- 6:56of what the inmates doing. Inside of his cell. You know,
- 7:00so what he's doing, you know, the inmates facing to
- 7:04the right, the inmates facing away from the staff. The
- 7:07inmate is, you know, doing what or makes these statements?
- 7:10Those statements will be written on the log. Question Okay,
- 7:14it says on or about July twenty third, twenty nineteen,
- 7:18Epstein was found on responsive on the floor of his
- 7:20cell with a homemade piece of fabric on his chest.
- 7:23When you say a homemade piece of fabric, can you
- 7:26explain that a little bit? Answer? Okay, basically a homemade
- 7:30piece of fabric. It could be anything because it's out
- 7:33of the special housing. That's what we're talking about, right,
- 7:36Answer yeah, I mean I'm talking about specifically in this instance.
- 7:40Do you know what it's meant by found on the
- 7:42floor with a homemade piece of fabric on his chest?
- 7:45Answer it could have been fragments from a T shirt.
- 7:48It could have been fragments from sheets. It could have
- 7:50been fragments from cloth. He gets cut off by the
- 7:53investigator that they could tie together. Answer it was tied together,
- 7:58you know, to make some type of home made fashioned.
- 8:01He gets cut off by the investigator. Did you see
- 8:03it out all though yourself answer, I can't remember. Question okay, sure,
- 8:08Epstein's cellmate had flagged the attention of a staff member,
- 8:12who handcuffed the cell mate and removed Epstein to bring
- 8:14him to medical unit. Do you recall at that time
- 8:17who his cell mate was? Answer Tartaglione, question okay, great,
- 8:23and did you all right? We talk about him in
- 8:25a little bit. Redacted her from his staff that Epstein
- 8:28may have been faking on consciousness. Do you know who
- 8:30told you that? Answer? Well, basically in memorandum. I remember
- 8:34when it was reported to me, and I made my report.
- 8:37I believe it was the report of incident by Lieutenant
- 8:40redacted redacted, and I believe that she put out an
- 8:45email which concluded behavior to manipulate the situation through his
- 8:49statements and what was observed by medical staff. So basically,
- 8:53they were saying that the incident didn't occur as the
- 8:56inmate may have tried to make it look or occur,
- 9:00because he was not observed opening his eyes and making
- 9:03other suspicious movements not consistent with an unconscious state, or sorry,
- 9:08because he was observed opening his eyes and making other
- 9:11suspicious movements not consistent with an unconscious state. Epstein was
- 9:15medically assessed and became coherent. Epstein claimed that a cellmate,
- 9:19Nicholas Tartaglioni, tried to take his life. Was that investigated? Answer?
- 9:24I believe. No, I mean, I can't remember, but I
- 9:27believe a report of incident may have been done. Question okay? Answer?
- 9:32And primarily when a report of incident is generated, So
- 9:35any time that an incident happens in the institution, I'm
- 9:38going to walk you through this. The lieutenant that's on
- 9:41shift is supposed to do the initial fact finding, the
- 9:44gathering of evidence, and all of these things, and then
- 9:48they write a brief synopsis and it's put up packet,
- 9:51and then ultimately SIS department will investigate it, especially if
- 9:55we're having an assault, which would have been a two
- 9:58to twenty four alpha, which is a minor assault of another.
- 10:01So pictures would have been taken, clinical assessments of both
- 10:04inmates would have been taken, witness statements would have been taken.
- 10:08All of these things would have been done, and it
- 10:11goes into an investigative packet. Question sure, so redacted, Lieutenant
- 10:16redacted would have created it and provided it to SIS.
- 10:21And do you know if there was any credibility found?
- 10:24To the claim that Epstein made that this other his
- 10:27cellmate had tried to take his life. Answer. I don't
- 10:31believe there was any credibility that was ever concluded that
- 10:35that incident happened. Question and do you know anything about
- 10:39when he was initially found, if the homemade rope or
- 10:42whatever it was, was found around his neck or it
- 10:45says in this on his chest, anything with that with
- 10:49you know? Do you know what I mean like, if
- 10:51someone has trying to hang themselves, if it came on
- 10:54their chest, do you know anything about how that may
- 10:56have happened. Answer? I mean, forensically, I would No, I'm
- 11:01not an investigator on that level, so I can't really
- 11:04tell you the position of any type of homemade fashioned
- 11:06item that would be used to facilitate a suicide attempt
- 11:09or an assault attempt. That's not my level. Again, I'm
- 11:13trying to remember what it was or what was used,
- 11:16But again I don't know exactly, so I can't really
- 11:19determine or give you that type of you know, I
- 11:21don't have that expertise in that area. So he gets
- 11:25cut off by the investigator. But the information that was
- 11:28provided to you suggested that he tried to take his
- 11:30own life, not that the cellmate tried to take his life. Answer, correct,
- 11:35that's the inconclusive that the inmate had Inmate Tartaglioni had
- 11:40tried to kill this guy or tried to do any
- 11:42self harm to this guy. So you have to so
- 11:45like you have to take advantage because it's one inmate's
- 11:48word against another. So when the investigation comes down, of course,
- 11:52inmate Epstein would have been interviewed in May, Tartaglioni would
- 11:55have been interviewed, at which time you would have took
- 11:58those statements. You would have wait, and then you would
- 12:01have taken into consideration any witness statements or anything that
- 12:04was observed during the clinical assessment. So that's why health
- 12:08services helps us out, because the inmates don't want to
- 12:11understand that everything they're doing or anything they're saying is
- 12:14being entered into that clinical assessment. So that's where they
- 12:19were saying that he wasn't His actions may not have
- 12:22been what they should have been for a person that
- 12:24was quasi supposed that had been assaulted, or if he
- 12:27was supposed to have been unconscious, he was displaying this
- 12:30type of behavior. So again I wasn't there, so I
- 12:34don't know what occurred. I'm just going by what was
- 12:37the information that was relayed back to me. Question absolutely so,
- 12:43as far as Tartaglioni, what was he in for? Answer?
- 12:47I believe that Tartaglioni was responsible for He was a
- 12:50former police officer, I believe, and I believe he had
- 12:53kill four people and then he buried them, buried the
- 12:55victims somewhere up near Otisville Prison. I think that's what
- 12:58it was back in the day. Question okay, Answer, yeah,
- 13:04something like that. Question So he was actually in for
- 13:08murder though, answer yeah, it was murder. He was in
- 13:10for murder and whatever other stuff he was doing. Question okay,
- 13:15answer doing in his capacity as a police officer. Question
- 13:20and who selected him to be Epstein's roommate. Answer? I
- 13:23don't remember who vetted Tartaglioni. But I will tell you
- 13:26is that even though Tartaglioni had murder on his jacket,
- 13:29Tartaglioni also was an inmate that had issues being in
- 13:33general population. You understand what I'm saying. Question former police officer, answer,
- 13:38former police officer. He had issues Because I've dealt with
- 13:42Tartaglioni at Brooklyn. So he was up on one of
- 13:45the units in Brooklyn, and he had issues with those
- 13:47inmates in those blocks where they're made for people who
- 13:50are sex offenders, for inmates that have issues with when
- 13:53they go to population general they can't cope formal law enforcement.
- 13:57These types of guys are in that unit. So you
- 14:00don't really have that much issue in those types of
- 14:02units because these guys are going to do their time
- 14:05or await their sentence and then move on, so you
- 14:08don't really have a lot of violence. But this guy
- 14:10was always always in the mix of something, but we
- 14:13couldn't put him in the general population unit, and you
- 14:15just can't throw him in the shoe, you know what
- 14:17I'm saying, just because you just can't. So in Brooklyn
- 14:21we had the ability to put him and I think
- 14:23it was K eighty two, I can't remember. When he
- 14:26goes to MCC, you know, they don't have those type
- 14:29of units, you know, so he would have to go
- 14:31into general population or he would go into the shoe.
- 14:34So if the inmate fails the program and said I'm
- 14:36not going to population, you can't force me. So when
- 14:39you do his assessment, the unit does the assessment Psychology
- 14:44does their assessment. Health Services does that assessment, and they'll say, hey,
- 14:49this guy is clear to go to GP, there's nothing
- 14:51precluded him to go. But the inmate said, well, you know,
- 14:55i'm a three oh six. Threeho six is a refusal
- 14:58for programs. I'm not going, so put me in the shoe.
- 15:01So that's how he ended up in the shoe. Question. Sure,
- 15:04so he was in the shoe already. Answer yeah. Question
- 15:07and do you believe he was a good placeman for Epstein?
- 15:11Answer well, at the time, Again, you would have to
- 15:14be mindful. We don't how could I put this. Inmates
- 15:16are not placed in cells based on a race or
- 15:19but however, or gang affiliations, all of these things that
- 15:22you know. But however, you've had inmates, so you say, okay,
- 15:26well you have guys up there that at MCC that
- 15:29were facing murder charges. There's a lot of them. Hey,
- 15:34I mean if they're in the shoe, that means they
- 15:36can't cope on the outside, they can't cope in general
- 15:39population unit. So we look at him just like another inmate.
- 15:42He never hurt another inmate question and that was going
- 15:45to be my next question. So he was not known
- 15:48to assault anyone. Answer, bro, he never assaulted another inmate.
- 15:52Question Okay, answer, Yeah, he got a murder beef. Okay,
- 15:55that's fine. But guess what, he's never hurt any inmates
- 15:58while incarcerated. Just to jump in, Yeah, because you had
- 16:02him in the shoe, that's why. How do you think
- 16:05he'd handle himself in GP? Question? So, taking though that
- 16:08he was incarcerated due to murder and that Epstein claimed
- 16:11that he tried to murder him, do you think do
- 16:14you believe that there was any credibility to that claim? Answer? Again,
- 16:17what I will say is that I will tell you,
- 16:20like you said my statements before that it was brought
- 16:23to my attention that inmate Epstein was doing behavior that
- 16:26was manipulating, kind of testing the water to see what
- 16:30he'd get away with. Being his initial incarceration, probably not
- 16:34too familiar with being in jail, But however, he's a
- 16:36smart guy. He kind of figured out what he could
- 16:38do in order for him one not to go to GP. Two,
- 16:42try to get to the shoe and try to get
- 16:44a cell by himself. That's kind of where he wanted
- 16:47to go. Question. So, then he wanted to go to
- 16:50the shoe by himself, and that may have been why
- 16:53he said, okay, okay, So you believe that he made
- 16:56the claim against Tartaglione because he wanted to be in
- 16:58a cell by himself. Answer, that's in my belief. After
- 17:02looking at everything and everything that was done, I believe
- 17:05so I think that would be accurate. All right, folks,
- 17:09we're gonna wrap up right here, and in the next
- 17:11episode dealing with the topic, we're gonna pick up where
- 17:13we left off. All the information that goes with this
- 17:16episode can be found in the description box.