Latest / The Epstein Chronicles / Mega Edition: Lesley Groff and the Administrative Backbone of Epstein’s World (8/2/26)

Transcript

Mega Edition: Lesley Groff and the Administrative Backbone of Epstein’s World (8/2/26) · The Epstein Chronicles

0:00
Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
0:02
Speaker 1: Epstein Chronicles. When it comes to Jeffrey Epstein, nobody was
0:07
Speaker 1: closer to him as far as assistants go than Leslie Groff.
0:13
Speaker 1: And she was somebody that Jeffrey Epstein said was indispensable
0:17
Speaker 1: to him. He even called her his brain. Now, for
0:22
Speaker 1: her part, Leslie Groff says she had no idea what
0:25
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein was up to, and that she was only
0:28
Speaker 1: somebody that was involved in logistics, answering the phone set
0:33
Speaker 1: in the schedule, things like that. And look, she has
0:37
Speaker 1: not been accused of any kind of abuse. Leslie Groff
0:42
Speaker 1: has not been accused of any of that. But does
0:45
Speaker 1: that mean she had nothing to do with what Epstein
0:48
Speaker 1: was up to? Does that mean she's innocent? Not in
0:51
Speaker 1: my opinion. Now, remember I look at this case through
0:55
Speaker 1: Rico Lenz. I'm not looking at it as one person
0:58
Speaker 1: doing this or one that It's all connected. So if
1:03
Speaker 1: you're part of the criminal enterprise, you're liable for every
1:07
Speaker 1: single crime that the enterprise commits, even if you're somebody
1:11
Speaker 1: that's just involved in logistics. And in my opinion, the
1:15
Speaker 1: whole lot of these people from the pilots on down
1:19
Speaker 1: were part of a criminal enterprise. So today we have
1:23
Speaker 1: an article from The Guardian which is pretty long, so
1:26
Speaker 1: we're going to eat it up in a couple of pieces,
1:29
Speaker 1: but it digs deep into leslie Groff and her relationship
1:33
Speaker 1: with Jeffrey Epstein. So with that said, let's just dive
1:37
Speaker 1: right in. This article was published by The Guardian and
1:40
Speaker 1: the headline seriously the best boss Ever Inside the world
1:44
Speaker 1: of Jeffrey Epstein's assistant. This article was authored by Sophie Elmhurst.
1:49
Speaker 1: Leslie Groff, longtime executive assistant to Jeffrey Epstein, has always
1:53
Speaker 1: claimed that she knew nothing of his crimes. Simplicity requires knowledge.
1:59
Speaker 1: To be legally implicit in a crime, you have to
2:01
Speaker 1: know you're helping to commit it. To be morally complicit,
2:04
Speaker 1: the bar is lower. You don't even have to play
2:06
Speaker 1: an active part. To have knowledge of the crime and
2:09
Speaker 1: do nothing is enough. But how do we know what
2:13
Speaker 1: someone knows? And you see right away, miss Elmhurst is
2:16
Speaker 1: not looking at it through the right lens. This should
2:19
Speaker 1: be a Rico lens. And that's because all these crimes
2:22
Speaker 1: were committed at the behest of Jeffrey Epstein. He was
2:25
Speaker 1: the head of the organization. No different than Al Chopo,
2:28
Speaker 1: no different than John Gotti, same shit, different crimes. I
2:34
Speaker 1: think of all the times I've closed my eyes or
2:36
Speaker 1: shut down a thought, or turned away from something wrong,
2:40
Speaker 1: large or small, a planet level ecological harm, or a
2:44
Speaker 1: subfiver theft in the supermarket right in front of me. Surely,
2:48
Speaker 1: I say to myself, someone else will do something. It's
2:51
Speaker 1: not my fault or my responsibility. I'm too inconsequential to
2:54
Speaker 1: make a difference here. Somewhere in the course of those thoughts,
2:58
Speaker 1: I decide not to let my knowledge of what I've
3:01
Speaker 1: seen or heard or inferred take up residence in my mind.
3:04
Speaker 1: In this way, over time, I found that it's much
3:07
Speaker 1: easier to live with what I know if I do
3:09
Speaker 1: not admit what I know, even to myself. Kind of
3:14
Speaker 1: a weird analogy. You know, you're talking about people that
3:17
Speaker 1: are stealing things from a store, a corporation and you're
3:21
Speaker 1: not getting involved, and comparing that to what was going
3:24
Speaker 1: on with Leslie Groff, that seems a bit weird. Leslie
3:29
Speaker 1: Groff never planned to be an assistant. After college at
3:32
Speaker 1: the University of Texas and Dallas, she moved to New
3:35
Speaker 1: Jersey with her first husband, worked for an office supply
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Speaker 1: company for nine years. Divorced, worked as a salesperson at
3:42
Speaker 1: the department store in Nordstrom met her second husband at
3:45
Speaker 1: a triathlon and then decided she wanted to try to
3:48
Speaker 1: find work as an events planner on Wall Street. In
3:52
Speaker 1: two thousand and one, a headhunter found a resume on Monster,
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Speaker 1: a job's listing site, and set up Groff, then in
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Speaker 1: her mid thirties, with an interview to be an assistant
4:01
Speaker 1: to a wealthy financier. And by two thousand and one
4:05
Speaker 1: Epstein was already abusing people. Remember this man was already prolific.
4:13
Speaker 1: For the interview, Groff went to Epstein's house on the
4:16
Speaker 1: fourth floor of four point fifty seven Madison Avenue, part
4:19
Speaker 1: of the Villard Houses, a set of elegant nineteenth century
4:23
Speaker 1: brownstone residences built around the courtyard, also home to a
4:27
Speaker 1: luxury hotel. These people belong in the Gilded Age, not
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Speaker 1: amongst us a bunch of weirdos. She met with Glenn
4:38
Speaker 1: Maxwell and Epstein, whose phone kept ringing during the interview.
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Speaker 1: He would talk briefly, then hang up, and Graff came
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Speaker 1: away with the impression of a vibrant, hectic workplace. And look,
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Speaker 1: I'm sure the first interview she didn't know what Epstein was.
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Speaker 1: But she was with Epstein for all those years, heard
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Speaker 1: all the stories, saw all those girls coming in and out,
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Speaker 1: had no idea. Okay, let's give her the benefit of
5:01
Speaker 1: the doubt. How does that explain all of the logistics
5:04
Speaker 1: that she set up though, for all the girls that
5:06
Speaker 1: were traffic I mean, if she was booking rooms, if
5:08
Speaker 1: she was setting up flights, doing any of that. Congratulations,
5:12
Speaker 1: you're a part of the investigation and you're culpable. Once
5:16
Speaker 1: she got the job, Groff was given her own office
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Speaker 1: and worked alongside Epstein's team of assistants, lawyers, and a trader,
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Speaker 1: who together managed his money and his life. Some years later,
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Speaker 1: she moved to work from his home, a seven story
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Speaker 1: townhouse on E seventy first Street near Fifth Avenue, where
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Speaker 1: a life sized sculpture of a woman in a white
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Speaker 1: wedding dress clutching a rope hung in the central hallway. Ah,
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Speaker 1: nothing weird there, normal stuff, right, just normal rich people shit.
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Speaker 1: Groff was in charge of Epstein's calendar, making his appointments
5:47
Speaker 1: and setting up his calls. When she started the job,
5:50
Speaker 1: Maxwell told her that Epstein had a massage every day.
5:54
Speaker 1: Epstein would call Groff in the morning or to her
5:56
Speaker 1: to call X and see if she can do a
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Speaker 1: massage at four, and then continue to call her every
6:01
Speaker 1: fifteen minutes until it was fixed. If Groff was unable
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Speaker 1: to get X, he'd tell her to call why. In
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Speaker 1: response to the questions about these appointments, her lawyer Michael
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Speaker 1: Backner wrote, during her employment, Leslie never witnessed or was
6:15
Speaker 1: told of anything illegal related to those massages. Maybe the
6:19
Speaker 1: next mob guy who gets Nell could say the same thing. Yo.
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Speaker 1: I had no idea. I was just making phone calls
6:25
Speaker 1: and driving the car. Groff worked for Epstein for eighteen years,
6:30
Speaker 1: from two thousand and one until his arrest in July
6:33
Speaker 1: of twenty nineteen. But she had no idea, huh after
6:37
Speaker 1: the first arrest, after all the allegations, after what everybody
6:40
Speaker 1: was saying after Virginia came out, Leslie Groff was none
6:43
Speaker 1: the wiser, had no idea what Epstein was. If you
6:46
Speaker 1: want to believe that, you go right ahead, me. I
6:49
Speaker 1: don't believe that for a second. Since Epstein's death in
6:55
Speaker 1: August twenty nineteen, Grof has remained almost invisible and spoken
7:00
Speaker 1: only through her lawyers. Recent photographs have shown her going
7:03
Speaker 1: to plates or walking her dog near her home in Connecticut,
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Speaker 1: off duty and low key. Compared to the royals, politicians, billionaires,
7:12
Speaker 1: and professors who have featured in the Epstein files, Groff
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Speaker 1: is low status, a non celebrity with no public reputation
7:20
Speaker 1: to lose. But when you search for her name in
7:23
Speaker 1: the files, you received more than one hundred and sixty
7:26
Speaker 1: thousand results, more than anyone else. I've read perhaps ten
7:30
Speaker 1: thousand of these a fraction. No one was more regularly
7:34
Speaker 1: in contact with Epstein day to day, and that's true.
7:38
Speaker 1: Epstein was very clear, Groff is his brain. He said
7:42
Speaker 1: that how many times throughout the years, Well, he thought
7:45
Speaker 1: he was kidding. Dude had a melt down when she
7:47
Speaker 1: had to go out for a praternity leave. After the
7:52
Speaker 1: release of the Epstein files, the US Congress Committee on
7:55
Speaker 1: Oversight and Government Reform decided to review the possible mismanagement
8:00
Speaker 1: of the federal government's investigation int Abstein and Maxwell's crimes.
8:04
Speaker 1: On March third, twenty twenty six, they sent a letter
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Speaker 1: to Grof asking her to attend an interview in Washington.
8:10
Speaker 1: On June ninth, the committee believes you have information that
8:15
Speaker 1: will assist in its investigation. They believe, in other words,
8:18
Speaker 1: that Graff knows more than she has ever said that
8:21
Speaker 1: she knows. Well. That's because, in my opinion, she does.
8:24
Speaker 1: And I think it's damning that she went back to
8:26
Speaker 1: work for the dude even after his first arrest. How
8:30
Speaker 1: can you say you have no idea what he was
8:32
Speaker 1: or what he was doing when he's already been arrested
8:35
Speaker 1: on similar charges. So the whole I had no idea
8:37
Speaker 1: thing really just doesn't hit. To be a good executive
8:42
Speaker 1: assistant is an act of immersion. The job requires the
8:46
Speaker 1: management of minutia, dates, times, appointments, travels, meals, gifts, emails, calls,
8:53
Speaker 1: but it also requires the anticipation of these things, to
8:57
Speaker 1: know what's desired before it's desired. To do this, the
9:00
Speaker 1: assistant must be familiar with the inside of their boss's mind.
9:04
Speaker 1: In a healthy arrangement, the relationship is close but boundaried.
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Speaker 1: She almost always she can tell her boss what she
9:11
Speaker 1: thinks or say no. Victoria Robin, the founder of the
9:16
Speaker 1: Executive Assistants Organization, described it as kind of a work marriage,
9:20
Speaker 1: no other professional relationship. She told me requires the same
9:24
Speaker 1: degree of trust or intimacy. Her old boss used to
9:27
Speaker 1: tell her that she knew more about him than his
9:29
Speaker 1: wife and can run him in five minutes. And that
9:33
Speaker 1: is pretty true and pretty common. These executive assistants, they
9:38
Speaker 1: know a lot. They're the ones that are there day
9:40
Speaker 1: to day. They see the people coming in, they see
9:43
Speaker 1: the people leaving. They know the phone calls, the emails,
9:46
Speaker 1: the meetings, they know all of it. While an assistant
9:49
Speaker 1: might have the power that comes from knowledge, it's not
9:52
Speaker 1: a marriage of equals. If you're committed, you sell your
9:55
Speaker 1: soul to that person, said Robin in a less professional dynamic.
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Speaker 1: The assistant so crucial to her boss daily existence and
10:02
Speaker 1: so completely in his power that she becomes a voiceless functionary.
10:07
Speaker 1: Rowena Cheu, briefly an assistant to Harvey Weinstein, compared her
10:11
Speaker 1: role to that of a butler in downtown abbey, where
10:14
Speaker 1: the chief requirement were it to do as you were
10:17
Speaker 1: told and remain invisible. Chu, who says she was sexually
10:21
Speaker 1: assaulted by Weinstein, was often told she could be replaced
10:25
Speaker 1: in an hour. She would hear Weinstein on the phone
10:28
Speaker 1: bawling out an a list director and think if he
10:31
Speaker 1: can do that to them, what can he do to me?
10:34
Speaker 1: She was, she said, anat on an elephant. And look,
10:38
Speaker 1: there's no doubt about that a lot of these people,
10:42
Speaker 1: like Harvey Weinstein are abusive. But that wasn't the case
10:45
Speaker 1: with Leslie Groff. She wasn't being abused by Jeffrey Epstein.
10:50
Speaker 1: There is zero reports of him sexually assaulting her or
10:53
Speaker 1: anything close to that. She was there because she was
10:56
Speaker 1: getting paid and she was willing to look the other way,
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Speaker 1: and my opinion, because she was making a bunch of dough.
11:02
Speaker 1: That's what it really boils down to. Over the years,
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Speaker 1: Epstein had several assistants, but Groff was the most senior
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Speaker 1: and longest serving. As I read her emails, I was
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Speaker 1: initially struck by the extent to which he marshaled his
11:16
Speaker 1: time and his movements, or acted as his gatekeeper, But
11:19
Speaker 1: in reality she was more like a well trained avatar.
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Speaker 1: In a two thousand and five New York Times article
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Speaker 1: about executive assistants on Wall Street, in which both Groff
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Speaker 1: and Epstein were interviewed, Epstein described as assistant as an
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Speaker 1: extension of my brain and a social prosthesis, not as
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Speaker 1: separate individuals, but as part of his mind and his body,
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Speaker 1: and that's how he looked at her. She was indispensable
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Speaker 1: to Jeffrey Epstein. Groff's task was to ensure that Epstein's
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Speaker 1: life ran according to his precise preference. Jeffrey's requested that
11:51
Speaker 1: he pleased not be disturbed while in the gym working out,
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Speaker 1: even if a guest is here waiting. She emailed her
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Speaker 1: colleagues in twenty twelve, when Jeffrey is waiting for something,
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Speaker 1: and you know the urgency with a package, you should
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Speaker 1: give it to him right away, if at all possible.
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Speaker 1: She wrote about a two hour delay in the delivery
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Speaker 1: of some pastries. In twenty fifteen, he called me asking
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Speaker 1: where's Canoli's are? On any given day, Groff would move
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Speaker 1: from having a towelrell fixed. Can we please get someone
12:19
Speaker 1: on top of this? To working out how to respond
12:22
Speaker 1: to Epstein's allergic reaction it's apparent that his face is
12:25
Speaker 1: not right to ensuring Steve Bannon how to receive Depstein's
12:29
Speaker 1: gift of an Apple Watch? Can you confirm Steve has
12:33
Speaker 1: his watch? I need to get back to Jeffrey. Sorry
12:36
Speaker 1: for being such a pain, and look. A lot of
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Speaker 1: her tasks were mundane. There is zero doubt about it,
12:41
Speaker 1: and I don't put as much responsibility on her as
12:45
Speaker 1: someone like Sarah Kellen Vickers. But just because you answered
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Speaker 1: the phone and did logistics doesn't mean that you're not culpable.
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Speaker 1: You are. She was good at her job, quick, polite,
12:56
Speaker 1: and relentlessly positive, even when her task tended towards the obsurdes,
13:00
Speaker 1: as when she had to deal with two monster vacuum
13:03
Speaker 1: pack stakes left beyond on Epstein's plane, or when she
13:07
Speaker 1: was trying to figure out how to transport three tubs
13:10
Speaker 1: of Oreo ice cream, Jaye's favorite, from New York to
13:14
Speaker 1: another of his properties without it melting. She wrote emails
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Speaker 1: bursting with exclamation marks, emoticons, particularly the smiling wink, and
13:23
Speaker 1: expressions of elation, tremendous, super terrific. When Jonathan Farkas, a
13:29
Speaker 1: New York businessman, told her that her efficiency was the
13:32
Speaker 1: envy of the German army, Groff sent the email to
13:36
Speaker 1: her husband like think I should forward to Jae Ike
13:40
Speaker 1: replied that she should save it in her files in
13:44
Speaker 1: case she ever needed another job. Epstein knew Groff was competent,
13:49
Speaker 1: but his emails rarely recognized her efforts. Beyond an occasional
13:52
Speaker 1: Kurt thanks. Instead, he showed his appreciation with money. In
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Speaker 1: the New York Times interview, he revealed that when Groff
14:00
Speaker 1: announced she was pregnant in two thousand and four, he
14:03
Speaker 1: offered to pay for a nanny and bought her a
14:05
Speaker 1: car to ease her commute from Connecticut. There's no way
14:09
Speaker 1: I could lose Leslie to motherhood, he said. According to
14:11
Speaker 1: a payroll document, she also doubled her salary from sixty
14:15
Speaker 1: thousand in two thousand and four to one hundred and
14:18
Speaker 1: twenty thousand in twenty twenty five. There were perks. In
14:22
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen, Epstein email Groth offering a Florida holiday, My Style, please,
14:28
Speaker 1: five star hotel. The whole works. Groff's husband, Ike, forwarded
14:32
Speaker 1: the email to someone else. Seriously, the best boss ever?
14:36
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, asked those girls that were getting abused how
14:39
Speaker 1: great he was. On Valentine's Day in twenty eighteen, Epstein
14:47
Speaker 1: bought her and some other assistants glam squad appointments, where
14:50
Speaker 1: stylists would come to their home to do their hair
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Speaker 1: and makeup. Too sweet, wrote Groth. Once in twenty fifteen,
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Speaker 1: she got to tour his private plane ride on his
15:00
Speaker 1: helicopter and take a boat to his private Caribbean island,
15:03
Speaker 1: Little Saint James, before staying at a luxury hotel. The
15:07
Speaker 1: helly was one of the best parts, she wrote in
15:10
Speaker 1: a group email to her family, who were duly impressed.
15:13
Speaker 1: I didn't know he had a helicopter too, wow, said
15:16
Speaker 1: one Not a boring job, wrote Groff's mother, Yeah, I
15:20
Speaker 1: would say so. Now let me ask you, is all
15:24
Speaker 1: of that worth what she's dealing with now? Not my opinion.
15:28
Speaker 1: All right, folks, we're gonna wrap this one up right here,
15:31
Speaker 1: and in the next episode we're gonna pick up where
15:33
Speaker 1: we left off. All the information that goes with this
15:36
Speaker 1: episode can be found in the description box. What's up, everyone,
15:40
Speaker 1: and welcome to another episode of the Epstein Chronicles. In
15:44
Speaker 1: this episode, we're going to pick up where we left off,
15:47
Speaker 1: talking about Leslie Groff once again. This article was published
15:52
Speaker 1: by the Guardian and the author is Sophie Elmhurst. By
15:57
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen, Groff was earning one hundred and forty thousand
16:01
Speaker 1: dollars a year and had been given several bonuses, the
16:05
Speaker 1: Florida trip and approval to buy a new car worth
16:08
Speaker 1: up to forty five thousand dollars. She was able to buy, rebuild,
16:12
Speaker 1: and decorate a white clap board house in the town
16:15
Speaker 1: of New Canaan, Connecticut, now estimated to be worth around
16:18
Speaker 1: five million dollars. Yeah, she had nothing to do with
16:21
Speaker 1: Epstein though, right, she didn't enrich herself from ill gotten
16:25
Speaker 1: gains or anything like that. Everything's on the up and up. Right,
16:28
Speaker 1: she made all that money on her own, though her
16:31
Speaker 1: emails also revealed she and Ike had to take out
16:33
Speaker 1: a large construction loan from the bank to do the work.
16:37
Speaker 1: In twenty sixteen, she emailed Ike to tell him her
16:40
Speaker 1: salary had gone up to one hundred and fifty thousand
16:43
Speaker 1: plus a seventy five hundred dollars bonus check not bad,
16:47
Speaker 1: and mentioned the loan she was going to take out
16:49
Speaker 1: with Epstein makes me happy. So really, what it comes
16:53
Speaker 1: down to is she's willing to turn a blind eye
16:55
Speaker 1: because she's benefiting so greatly. Now, of course, the problem
16:59
Speaker 1: is proving that legally, and the way to do that
17:01
Speaker 1: would have been rico. But since they didn't do that,
17:04
Speaker 1: it's going to be rough. And that, my friends, has
17:08
Speaker 1: always been part of the bigger problem them controlling this
17:13
Speaker 1: story and controlling the blast radius, Graff seemed to sense
17:19
Speaker 1: limits to Epstein's generosity. He was not a cash cow,
17:23
Speaker 1: or at least the money he gave was on his terms.
17:26
Speaker 1: Ahead of a family mini break in New York, Ike
17:28
Speaker 1: suggested she asked Epstein to get them tickets for a show.
17:32
Speaker 1: The cost would mean nothing to Epstein, but Groff felt
17:35
Speaker 1: she couldn't justify asking for five hundred dollars Hamilton seats
17:39
Speaker 1: and wondered if she could swing Dear Evan Hanson instead.
17:42
Speaker 1: When Groff got her raised to one hundred and forty
17:44
Speaker 1: thousand dollars in twenty fourteen, Ike, who worked for Tourmaline Partners,
17:49
Speaker 1: a trading firm, joked that he could retire. Ah, please,
17:52
Speaker 1: don't do that, Groff replied she was well paid, but
17:56
Speaker 1: always aware that she lived in a different economic reality
17:59
Speaker 1: to Boss. In her FBI interview, Groff recalled seeing an
18:03
Speaker 1: invoice of a carpet for his aeroplane that amounted to
18:06
Speaker 1: more than she earned in a year. Well, yeah, you're
18:09
Speaker 1: working for a guy that has billions. Oh, I know,
18:12
Speaker 1: they'll say he only had five hundred million. Yeah, that
18:16
Speaker 1: you could track. Do you really think a guy like
18:18
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein didn't have any kind of secret backup accounts
18:23
Speaker 1: all over the damn world. My opinion, he most certainly did.
18:27
Speaker 1: Graff's emails were a full of celebrities and their staff.
18:30
Speaker 1: There was Amanda, who assisted the then Duchess of York,
18:34
Speaker 1: Bill Gates, Lauren Larry Summers, Julie, Woody, Allen's Catherine and Ginny.
18:39
Speaker 1: She had to check the timing of a meeting with
18:41
Speaker 1: Naomi Campbell, who signed off her emails love and Light.
18:44
Speaker 1: And it was Groff's job to figure out which car
18:47
Speaker 1: the duke should be picked up in and what Woody,
18:50
Speaker 1: Allen and sun Ye would like for dinner. Woody would
18:53
Speaker 1: like chicken dumplings with cilantro peery peerie chicken wings. I
18:58
Speaker 1: would love grilled asparagus, gome whatever the fuck that is,
19:02
Speaker 1: egg planch a, shestow miso, honey and shrimp, tempora and
19:06
Speaker 1: seasoned vegetables, confirmed sun Ye, whose emails from her phone
19:11
Speaker 1: were accompanied by the red balloon emoji, given each an
19:14
Speaker 1: error of minor celebration, and it kind of gives you
19:17
Speaker 1: an inside look right at just how connected Epstein was
19:20
Speaker 1: and all these people that previously told us that they
19:22
Speaker 1: didn't know them intimately have been outed by the emails
19:29
Speaker 1: privy to so much detail. The terms of Grov's job
19:32
Speaker 1: were strict. She told the FBI that when she was
19:34
Speaker 1: hired by Epstein, she had to sign a non disclosure agreement.
19:38
Speaker 1: If she ever spoke about anything she learned from people
19:41
Speaker 1: he had worked with, she would have to pay one
19:43
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars. Early on, Maxwella told her she was
19:47
Speaker 1: here to work, not to chat or frat nize with
19:49
Speaker 1: anyone she met through her job, including Epstein. If, for example,
19:54
Speaker 1: she bought tickets for Epstein to see a movie, she
19:56
Speaker 1: knew not to ask them if he enjoyed the movie
19:58
Speaker 1: the next day. YE know, I cannot work for somebody
20:00
Speaker 1: like that. I'm sorry. The money is not enough. Imagine
20:05
Speaker 1: having a boss where you can't even ask him if
20:07
Speaker 1: he enjoyed his movie. Fucking absurd. Groff was expected to
20:12
Speaker 1: maintain the facade that she knew nothing to no one.
20:15
Speaker 1: In her first month on the job, she told the
20:17
Speaker 1: FBI she was invited to a party through work and
20:20
Speaker 1: went along with her husband, disobeying the non fratnizing rule.
20:24
Speaker 1: Epstein found out and torched her the following Monday, he
20:28
Speaker 1: told her he was going to fire her put her
20:30
Speaker 1: on a probation. Groff never did anything like it again.
20:34
Speaker 1: Mistakes she learned were not tolerated. And look, I understand
20:38
Speaker 1: that people have bills, they have responsibilities, families, kids, the
20:41
Speaker 1: whole thing. But at what point do you say enough
20:44
Speaker 1: is enough? And at what point do you realize that
20:48
Speaker 1: the person you're working for is an absolute piece of shit?
20:51
Speaker 1: Not once Groff told the FBI did she have normal
20:54
Speaker 1: conversations with Epstein. Instead, he would issue one line decisions yes, no,
20:59
Speaker 1: pay it burgers, and Graff would reply with a quick,
21:03
Speaker 1: chirpy confirmation, we'll do. Epstein knew that he could rely
21:07
Speaker 1: on her to do anything fast and well. When an
21:09
Speaker 1: employee offered a litany of excuses as to why they'd
21:12
Speaker 1: fail to ship a painting from Paris to New York,
21:15
Speaker 1: Epstein replied with a single line, give the job to Leslie. Thanks.
21:20
Speaker 1: When Leslie when on holiday, she reassured Epstein that she
21:23
Speaker 1: would have her BlackBerry with her, Well, that's pretty common. Honestly.
21:28
Speaker 1: When I was in the corporate rat race, when I
21:30
Speaker 1: got a vacation, which was very rare, I had three
21:34
Speaker 1: phones with me. I had two work phones, and then
21:37
Speaker 1: I had my personal cell phone, and I hated every
21:39
Speaker 1: minute of it. And now that I'm not behold into
21:42
Speaker 1: that stupid ass phone, I very rarely ever answer it,
21:46
Speaker 1: So I understand that part of it. I hated it
21:49
Speaker 1: so much. It was like attached to me. And if
21:53
Speaker 1: you didn't answer a call or you missed a call,
21:55
Speaker 1: forget it. He replied by instructing her where she needed
21:58
Speaker 1: to be on the date of her return seventy first
22:01
Speaker 1: on the twentieth, meaning his house Groth. Of course, I
22:04
Speaker 1: can't wait. Over time, I began to recognize the tone
22:08
Speaker 1: of Graff's emails. Epstein there reminded me of the kinds
22:11
Speaker 1: of messages I sent in my first jobs at the
22:14
Speaker 1: lowest level of institutions, where I still naively thought the
22:18
Speaker 1: good behavior would be noticed and rewarded. It's the tone
22:22
Speaker 1: of service, of knowing your place and being eager to please,
22:25
Speaker 1: often used by junior women to senior men. It's also
22:29
Speaker 1: the tone of a perfectionist, of someone trying to create
22:33
Speaker 1: an impression of flawlessness, where everything is possible and nothing
22:37
Speaker 1: is too much. You'll do all that is asked of you,
22:40
Speaker 1: and more, running as consistently and indefeatingly as a machine.
22:45
Speaker 1: And crucially you will never say no. Well, yeah, that's
22:49
Speaker 1: pretty much the job, right. I mean, I don't understand
22:53
Speaker 1: what she means. If you're a junior manager of any sort,
22:58
Speaker 1: you're going to be jumping through hoops. And I think
23:01
Speaker 1: the most thankless job in the whole entire world is
23:04
Speaker 1: middle management. You get all the blame, all the responsibility,
23:08
Speaker 1: half the pay, and all the stress. The colleague who
23:14
Speaker 1: failed to ship the painting confide it in Groff about Epstein.
23:17
Speaker 1: It's been tough with them, I'll bet, replied Groff sympathetically.
23:21
Speaker 1: In twenty fourteen, Groff exchanged emails with a colleague who
23:25
Speaker 1: had just been on the receiving end of an Epstein
23:27
Speaker 1: email which was worse than ever swearing and telling me
23:31
Speaker 1: on a disgrace. He literally has never been this bad,
23:35
Speaker 1: which is saying a lot. Groff tried to offer some support,
23:38
Speaker 1: then suggested that the person take the bull by the
23:41
Speaker 1: horns and go. They were grateful for her encouragement. It
23:45
Speaker 1: really helps Groff for some reason, never followed her own advice.
23:49
Speaker 1: For some reason, how about financial reasons? That's why she
23:52
Speaker 1: didn't follow her own advice. The last thing she wanted
23:55
Speaker 1: to do was lose out on that money. We all
23:57
Speaker 1: know people who do some wild ship for some dough
24:00
Speaker 1: sell crack to their family. Whatever money makes people do
24:04
Speaker 1: all kinds of wild shit. Graff's emails inviting girls her
24:07
Speaker 1: word to see Epstein all followed a particular pattern. Often
24:12
Speaker 1: the arrangement involved in negotiation around the timing of their
24:15
Speaker 1: job or classes in college. Tuesday, I'm at school till ten.
24:19
Speaker 1: We have orchestra rehearsal for a concert on Friday. Groff
24:22
Speaker 1: would also receive emails from intermediaries on behalf of other girls.
24:27
Speaker 1: She can skip some classes and leave school at one pm.
24:30
Speaker 1: If Jeffrey wants her at three thirty, she can make it.
24:33
Speaker 1: Groff replied, okay, all good to know. I'll let Jae decide. Thanks.
24:38
Speaker 1: This is where Grof has a problem. These kids, these people,
24:42
Speaker 1: some of them were kids, were being managed by Grof.
24:47
Speaker 1: She was the one that was setting up the meetings.
24:49
Speaker 1: She's the one that's emailing them and leading them directly
24:53
Speaker 1: into the belly of the beast. That, my friends, is
24:56
Speaker 1: being part of the criminal enterprise. And you can say
25:00
Speaker 1: you didn't know, but being ignorant of a crime doesn't
25:03
Speaker 1: mean that you're innocent of it. Sometimes Groff struggled to
25:06
Speaker 1: find someone Epstein had requested. Jeffrey thinks I should have
25:09
Speaker 1: her info, but I can't find any Whose friend is she?
25:12
Speaker 1: Do you know? Sometimes she would try to predict her
25:16
Speaker 1: boss's requirements. What does JE want to see in Paris?
25:20
Speaker 1: Is that redacted? Do one of you know? Her colleagues replied,
25:24
Speaker 1: I think possible redacted? We always see her in Paris.
25:28
Speaker 1: Once she spent a day emailing back and forth with
25:30
Speaker 1: someone in Russia trying to fix a time for her
25:33
Speaker 1: to see Epstein, before realizing that he had meant a
25:36
Speaker 1: different person with the same name. So no worries, talk
25:40
Speaker 1: to you next week. And here's a big problem for Grof.
25:43
Speaker 1: If the girls were coming from overseas, Groff organizer er
25:47
Speaker 1: travel visas and accommodation. That makes her part of it.
25:51
Speaker 1: Smack dab in the middle. Juliette Bryant told me a
25:55
Speaker 1: survivor who had met Epstein in South Africa and then
25:57
Speaker 1: spent two years in New York after Abbs had promised
26:01
Speaker 1: her a modeling career. Epstein would never contact Brian directly,
26:05
Speaker 1: but Groff would ring often say hi, Juliette, it's Leslie.
26:09
Speaker 1: Then put Epstein on the line. She seemed friendly, said Bryant,
26:14
Speaker 1: But they never spoke much more than the top of
26:16
Speaker 1: the tail of a call. She only met Groff once. Surely,
26:20
Speaker 1: Brian thought, Groff must have been aware that something wasn't right.
26:24
Speaker 1: If I'd been working in that office, I'd have found
26:27
Speaker 1: it odd, she said, with all the young girls coming
26:29
Speaker 1: and going, look one hundred percent. And I agree with Juliette,
26:34
Speaker 1: But how do we prove that. Remember, it's not what
26:38
Speaker 1: we know, it's what we can prove, and I think
26:41
Speaker 1: a lot of people have forgotten that. So the only
26:43
Speaker 1: way to get to the bottom of it, the only
26:45
Speaker 1: way to prove it is to charge all of these
26:48
Speaker 1: people with RICO. Then that gives the government the tools
26:52
Speaker 1: they need to really dig into their lives. But unfortunately
26:56
Speaker 1: that's not going to happen. The rotating cast to girls
27:00
Speaker 1: generated another layer of administration. Groff returned their lost property.
27:04
Speaker 1: Please check for a green bikini kind of jungle print
27:08
Speaker 1: in one of the drawers. The girl who was there
27:11
Speaker 1: last thinks she left it in the drawer. She arranged
27:14
Speaker 1: their payments in cash, usually between five hundred and one
27:17
Speaker 1: thousand one, specifically for time spent on the island. She
27:21
Speaker 1: would arrange appointments for them at his preferred New York dentist,
27:24
Speaker 1: Thomas Magnonnie and hair salon Frederick Focai, and sometime for herself.
27:30
Speaker 1: In twenty eighteen, Groff had a haircut highlights manicure an
27:34
Speaker 1: eyebrow wax worth eight hundred and twenty five dollars. And
27:37
Speaker 1: if you're wondering why she didn't want to leave Epstein,
27:39
Speaker 1: there it is. Who wants to give up those perks
27:43
Speaker 1: eight hundred and twenty five bucks. I mean, come on,
27:46
Speaker 1: it's like rent. Once, when Epstein's accountants questioned the payment
27:51
Speaker 1: to a cosmetic vein specialist and suggested a name of
27:54
Speaker 1: who the treatment should have been for, Groff responded, gosh,
27:57
Speaker 1: I really don't know. She seems too young for that.
28:02
Speaker 1: Well that's damning, but sure Groff had no idea, Leslie
28:05
Speaker 1: Groff just you know, somebody at work doing her job,
28:09
Speaker 1: no idea the evil she's working with in forour Does
28:13
Speaker 1: anyone really believe that Groff was not the only assistant
28:17
Speaker 1: to arrange these appointments. Rina oh An, Epstein's survivor, told
28:22
Speaker 1: me that different secretaries communicated with certain girls, but they
28:25
Speaker 1: always followed the same script. Mister Epstein would like to
28:28
Speaker 1: make an appointment to see you. He's going to be
28:31
Speaker 1: in New York on such and such dates. Are you
28:33
Speaker 1: available to see him at two pm? Then I would
28:36
Speaker 1: have to confirm, and then she would write it in
28:39
Speaker 1: the calendar. Graff's emails to girls on Epstein's behalf were
28:42
Speaker 1: typically formal and careful in their language and brightened tone,
28:48
Speaker 1: but the reply she received could be unpredictable. On May fifth,
28:51
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen, an email arrived from a girl who told
28:54
Speaker 1: her that her friend would not be available to see
28:57
Speaker 1: Jeffrey on mayas, but I can bring another girl if
29:00
Speaker 1: Jeffrey want to let me know. Groff sent the email
29:03
Speaker 1: to Epstein below from redacted. Please advise literally setting it
29:09
Speaker 1: up literally culpable, at least in my opinion, And I
29:14
Speaker 1: think the evidence is right here, the emails, that paper
29:18
Speaker 1: trail of emails that lead directly back to Leslie Groff
29:22
Speaker 1: setting up these girls with Jeffrey Epstein. That's a big problem,
29:26
Speaker 1: or should be if we had a real investigation. Sometimes
29:31
Speaker 1: the emails can with photographs attached. On April eighth, twenty twelve,
29:37
Speaker 1: someone emailed apologizing for a delay and send pictures of
29:40
Speaker 1: two friends, both Russians. No worries, thanks, replied Groff. On
29:44
Speaker 1: May first, twenty twelve, a person email to check of
29:48
Speaker 1: Groff had received a new photo. Graff hadn't, so they
29:51
Speaker 1: sent it again with the subject line redacted from Ukraine, Darling.
29:56
Speaker 1: Here's the picture of a new girl. She's twenty one,
29:58
Speaker 1: very sweet and lovely. Let me know you receive them please.
30:03
Speaker 1: I took them from her portfolio, so maybe the quality
30:06
Speaker 1: is not so good, but I think you can still
30:08
Speaker 1: see everything. Groff sent the email to Epstein without comment.
30:12
Speaker 1: And look, people will say she was of age. That's true,
30:16
Speaker 1: but does that mean she couldn't be trafficked. I think
30:19
Speaker 1: people need to understand that even if you're an adult,
30:22
Speaker 1: you can be manipulated and trafficked. Now, it's a lot
30:25
Speaker 1: harder to prove without a doubt, but to act like
30:28
Speaker 1: it can't happen or it doesn't happen is completely ridiculous.
30:32
Speaker 1: Groff also fielded the girl's questions and concerns after arranging
30:36
Speaker 1: an appointment with a girl and her friend to see
30:38
Speaker 1: Epstein on the evening of the twenty first of October
30:42
Speaker 1: twenty eleven. She received the following email from the girl
30:45
Speaker 1: at three forty five pm that day. Hey, Leslie, my
30:49
Speaker 1: friend just got back and I spoke to her about tonight.
30:52
Speaker 1: She has never done anything of this sort before, and
30:55
Speaker 1: it's a little nervous about the whole thing. I don't
30:57
Speaker 1: know what Jeffrey has planned for tonight. But is it
31:00
Speaker 1: okay if they just met this time? She would really
31:02
Speaker 1: feel more comfortable that way. If Jeffrey would rather not,
31:05
Speaker 1: it's okay, let me know, Groff responded. He says, of course,
31:10
Speaker 1: you can just stop by. So what exactly did Leslie
31:13
Speaker 1: Groff think was going down? Did she think they were
31:15
Speaker 1: coming over to talk about the stock market or get
31:18
Speaker 1: advice on their tax planning like Leon Black? Because I
31:20
Speaker 1: have to tell you, the optics here are not good.
31:24
Speaker 1: And when it comes to Leslie Groff and her narrative
31:26
Speaker 1: of not knowing, I find that harder to believe by
31:29
Speaker 1: the day, because when you look at the emails, and
31:31
Speaker 1: you look at all of the evidence that has been
31:34
Speaker 1: produced and what everybody has said about who's invited them
31:38
Speaker 1: to Ebstein's house, who managed it, In my opinion, I
31:42
Speaker 1: don't know, is not good enough, and hopefully when Leslie
31:45
Speaker 1: Groff is speaking in front of Congress, they drill down
31:48
Speaker 1: a little bit and try to get to the bottom
31:50
Speaker 1: of it. All right, folks, we're going to wrap up
31:53
Speaker 1: this episode right here, and in the next episode we're
31:55
Speaker 1: going to pick up where we left off. All the
31:58
Speaker 1: information that goes with this episode can be found in
32:01
Speaker 1: the description box. What's up, everyone, and welcome to another
32:04
Speaker 1: episode of the Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're going
32:08
Speaker 1: to get right back to the article about Leslie Groff
32:11
Speaker 1: that was published in The Guardian, and the author is
32:15
Speaker 1: Sophie Elmhurst. The first time that Groff's name appeared in
32:19
Speaker 1: legal documents connected to Epstein's crimes was in the secret
32:22
Speaker 1: plead deal he made with the State Attorney's office in
32:25
Speaker 1: South Florida in return for federal immunity and immunity for
32:30
Speaker 1: various assistants, including Grof. Epstein agreed to plead guilty in
32:34
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight to two low level state charges,
32:37
Speaker 1: which included the charge of solicitation of miners to engage
32:41
Speaker 1: in prostitution. And she still kept working for him after
32:44
Speaker 1: all that, So please spare me the nonsense. It's one
32:48
Speaker 1: thing to try and tell us that you had no
32:49
Speaker 1: idea who he was or what he was, and then
32:52
Speaker 1: it's a whole lass other thing to keep working for
32:54
Speaker 1: him when that mask has already been ripped off. And
32:57
Speaker 1: I think that's the biggest problem for people like Grof,
33:01
Speaker 1: Kellen Vickers and Adriana Ross. I mean, it's a big deal.
33:07
Speaker 1: When I asked Rof's lawyer Michael Backner about our knowledge
33:10
Speaker 1: of the two thousand and eight conviction, he replied. After
33:12
Speaker 1: Epstein's arrest in two thousand and eight, he continuously lied
33:16
Speaker 1: to Leslie and other members of the staff, insisting that
33:19
Speaker 1: he had been blackmailed and set up. He angrily said
33:22
Speaker 1: that the allegations against him were simply false and he
33:25
Speaker 1: had no idea that the prostitute he had contact with
33:29
Speaker 1: was a minor. In Leslie's mind, that was the reason
33:33
Speaker 1: that he was treated so leniently by law enforcement before
33:36
Speaker 1: and after he was sentenced. Oh well that is pretty convenient, huh.
33:40
Speaker 1: And have you noticed everybody's just blaming Epstein now that
33:44
Speaker 1: he's dead. They have no problem pointing the finger at
33:46
Speaker 1: Epstein when he was alive, though nobody said shit, nobody
33:50
Speaker 1: had the courage to come forward then, but now, well,
33:53
Speaker 1: I don't want to get in trouble, so it was him,
33:55
Speaker 1: not me, And it's the same kind of defense that
33:58
Speaker 1: Sarah Kelln Vickers is trying to use. Over the subsequent years,
34:03
Speaker 1: Groff has continued to work for Epstein. She was made
34:05
Speaker 1: aware of the controversy around the Plea Deal's terms on
34:09
Speaker 1: March twenty fifth, twenty eleven. Her husband Ike emailed her
34:12
Speaker 1: a link to a story in The Daily Beast Jeffrey
34:15
Speaker 1: Epstein how the hedge fund mogul pedophile got off easy.
34:19
Speaker 1: Groff replied, Yeah, he told me yesterday this would be
34:22
Speaker 1: in the Daily Beast. And one thing I'll say about
34:25
Speaker 1: the Deli Beast is that they continuously reported on Epstein
34:29
Speaker 1: even before it was popular to do so, So certainly
34:32
Speaker 1: a tip of the cap to them for that. Now,
34:34
Speaker 1: does that mean everything they do I agree with, of
34:36
Speaker 1: course not. But when it comes to their Epstein reporting,
34:39
Speaker 1: especially Kate Bricklett, they did a really good job. And
34:43
Speaker 1: when other outlets were running from this story, the Dealy
34:46
Speaker 1: Beast was running stories about it, and they were also
34:49
Speaker 1: calling out Epstein at the time, which a lot of
34:52
Speaker 1: other people weren't willing to do. Then In twenty seventeen,
34:57
Speaker 1: a case was brought by the author Sarah ram who
35:00
Speaker 1: alleged that she had been abused by Epstein and this
35:03
Speaker 1: abuse had been facilitated by Maxwell, Groff and two other
35:07
Speaker 1: staff members. Later that year, Ransom withdrew the case against
35:11
Speaker 1: Groff and the other staff and reached the settlement with
35:14
Speaker 1: Epstein and Maxwell the following year. And that's how it
35:18
Speaker 1: always worked out, always the settlement, never discovery, and never
35:22
Speaker 1: any real evidence being produced. And that was all by design,
35:26
Speaker 1: all of that, and that's why when Maxwell ended up
35:30
Speaker 1: going to discovery with Virginia, I was blown away. I
35:33
Speaker 1: was honestly shocked that it progressed that far. But I
35:37
Speaker 1: think at the time Maxwell was between a rock and
35:39
Speaker 1: a hard place. She had said for so long that
35:42
Speaker 1: Virginia was a liar she had to put up. But
35:46
Speaker 1: her lawsuit with Virginia led directly to Maxwell being convicted,
35:50
Speaker 1: and it also opened the door for everything we're seeing now.
35:54
Speaker 1: Groff continued to work for Epstein until his arrest in
35:57
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. In his will, written two days before his
36:00
Speaker 1: death on August tenth, twenty nineteen, he put his estate
36:04
Speaker 1: into a trust to be distributed among various friends and relations,
36:08
Speaker 1: with most fifty million dollars going to his last partner, Corinashuliac.
36:13
Speaker 1: Smaller sums were assigned to Maxwell ten million, his brother,
36:17
Speaker 1: his pilot, and various other staff members. Groff was listed
36:21
Speaker 1: in a clause under the subheading after my death, I
36:25
Speaker 1: forgive any loans which I made to the following individuals
36:28
Speaker 1: or entities Leslie Katherine Groff. After Epstein's death, Groff was
36:35
Speaker 1: named in several lawsuits, including those brought by anonymous victims
36:39
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty one, that were later dismissed.
36:44
Speaker 1: As a condition for receiving money from the Epstein Victims
36:47
Speaker 1: Compensation Program, survivors were barred from pursuing any legal action
36:52
Speaker 1: against Epstein's estate or former employees. By the time it
36:56
Speaker 1: closed in twenty twenty one, the program had awarded one
36:59
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty one one million to one hundred and
37:01
Speaker 1: thirty five survivors. Now think about that, not even a
37:05
Speaker 1: million each. Now, of course some people got more and
37:09
Speaker 1: some people got less. But Jeffrey Epstein's fortune was what
37:13
Speaker 1: five hundred and forty something million, and you're only doling
37:17
Speaker 1: out a fifth of that to the people who were
37:20
Speaker 1: harmed the most. I thought it was disgusting then and
37:23
Speaker 1: I still think so now. And I got to tell you,
37:26
Speaker 1: I would have never accepted that offer ever. If I
37:29
Speaker 1: was somebody who was abused, No fucking way I would
37:33
Speaker 1: have went to the mattresses, especially after finding out that
37:36
Speaker 1: the Virgin Islands, the US Virgin Islands, got more money
37:39
Speaker 1: than all the girls together combined. Imagine that shit. They
37:44
Speaker 1: were allegedly culpable for helping Epstein. So they ate at
37:48
Speaker 1: one end of the table, and then after dinner was done,
37:51
Speaker 1: they went and ate at the other. But these survivors
37:53
Speaker 1: have been maligned and said they're just chasing a payday.
37:58
Speaker 1: Not really the kind of payday that people are thinking
38:00
Speaker 1: in here. Groff's name also appeared in FBI interviews conducted
38:04
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty one. In the twenty
38:07
Speaker 1: twenty one interview, the victim, who was under eighteen at
38:10
Speaker 1: the time, described how Groff arranged her appointments with Epstein,
38:14
Speaker 1: which were massages that turned sexual right away. She thought
38:18
Speaker 1: it was pretty obvious leslie knew what was going on,
38:21
Speaker 1: though she never said anything to Groff about the massages.
38:24
Speaker 1: And look, I've heard that from several different people, but
38:27
Speaker 1: it's very hard to prove. And unless you're charging Rico here,
38:31
Speaker 1: then I don't think you have enough to go on,
38:33
Speaker 1: certainly not enough to get a conviction. She would tell
38:36
Speaker 1: Groff if a friend couldn't make it, and suggest other girls. Groff,
38:39
Speaker 1: she said, also arrange payment from Epstein to cover an
38:42
Speaker 1: abortion and payments to cover accommodation when she was staying
38:46
Speaker 1: at hotels. She said that Groff told her that she
38:50
Speaker 1: couldn't get an apartment as she was not yet eighteen,
38:53
Speaker 1: so Groff knew she was underage, sending her to go
38:57
Speaker 1: get abortions. All kinds of shit. Really, and you I
39:00
Speaker 1: have no idea, you have no culpability. Sorry, I don't
39:04
Speaker 1: buy it. The most prominent of the cases naming Groff
39:08
Speaker 1: was a civil suit brought by Jennifer ARREOs against Epstein's
39:11
Speaker 1: escape after his death. Arreo said that she had been
39:15
Speaker 1: abused and raped by Epstein in his own when she
39:18
Speaker 1: was fourteen and fifteen years old. In her complaint, Arreo's attorney,
39:23
Speaker 1: Daniel Kaiser, claimed that miss Groff directly facilitated, as well
39:26
Speaker 1: as conspired with Epstein and other co conspirators to make
39:30
Speaker 1: possible and otherwise facilitate the sexual offenses committed against minor plaintiff,
39:35
Speaker 1: Miss ARREOs. And that's the rico, right. You have all
39:38
Speaker 1: these people working in coordination to commit crimes, and those
39:43
Speaker 1: crimes are benefiting Jeffrey Epstein directly, and from there it
39:47
Speaker 1: all rains down on everybody else. This is not that difficult.
39:52
Speaker 1: But the whole entire point was never to charge this
39:55
Speaker 1: as a criminal enterprise. They always wanted to piece it off.
40:00
Speaker 1: They wanted to go after Epstein as a singular dude.
40:02
Speaker 1: That way they can have a nice storyline for us
40:05
Speaker 1: about how he was just a sick guy with proclivities
40:08
Speaker 1: and all the other stuff was just a bunch of bs.
40:10
Speaker 1: In response, Groff's lawyers, John Whitcomb and Michael Backner argued
40:14
Speaker 1: that Areos had confused Groff with someone else. The alleged
40:18
Speaker 1: crimes had been committed at Epstein's house at a time
40:21
Speaker 1: when Grof wasn't based there. Groff's job, they said, did
40:25
Speaker 1: not include arranging sexual liaisons with underage girls. In fact,
40:29
Speaker 1: they argued, Groff was an innocent party who had been
40:32
Speaker 1: wrongfully maligned for years based upon sheer speculation, conjecture, and innuendo.
40:38
Speaker 1: If she were for Jeffrey Epstein, she ipso fact though,
40:41
Speaker 1: must have known he was abusing teenage girls and must
40:44
Speaker 1: have participated therein they emphasized one key point, she didn't know. Well, look,
40:50
Speaker 1: I'm not saying she abused anybody physically. I've never seen
40:53
Speaker 1: that evidence. I'm saying she's part of the problem, part
40:57
Speaker 1: of the machine, part of the RICO organization that Epstein
41:01
Speaker 1: was running. On December first, twenty twenty, the case was dismissed.
41:08
Speaker 1: Areos had withdrawn because of the condition set by the
41:11
Speaker 1: compensation program, declared her lawyer were not surprised that the
41:14
Speaker 1: civil case has been dropped since Leslie found out about
41:17
Speaker 1: these inexplicable crimes when the rest of the world did,
41:21
Speaker 1: said Bagner at the time. As a wife and a mother,
41:24
Speaker 1: Leslie remains heartbroken for Jennifer and all the victims, added Whitcomb.
41:28
Speaker 1: So heartbroken she never came forward, so heartbroken. She never
41:32
Speaker 1: rat it on Jeffrey Epstein. But don't worry everybody, Leslie Groff,
41:36
Speaker 1: she was heartbroken. When I asked Bauckner about the allegations
41:42
Speaker 1: in all the civil suits naming Groff, he said that
41:44
Speaker 1: they were simply wrong, confused, and devoid of any facts
41:47
Speaker 1: establishing that she had any idea of Epstein's horrible and
41:51
Speaker 1: nefarious conduct. In fact, in some instances, the conclusiony conduct
41:55
Speaker 1: alleged against her occurred years before Leslie was even employed
42:00
Speaker 1: by mister Epstein. We note that every civil case against
42:03
Speaker 1: Leslie was dismissed and she never paid a cent towards
42:07
Speaker 1: the settlement. Cool so she'll have no problem removing herself
42:11
Speaker 1: from the NPA. Right go to the lawyers, go to
42:15
Speaker 1: the court and say, look, I don't need that protection
42:18
Speaker 1: of the NPA. Drop it. I want to tell my story.
42:23
Speaker 1: Doubt she's going to do that. Although all the civil
42:27
Speaker 1: cases were dropped, Groff was still under a criminal investigation.
42:31
Speaker 1: But in December of twenty twenty one, Whitcommon Backner stated
42:34
Speaker 1: that after a two year investigation, federal prosecutors had decided
42:38
Speaker 1: not to bring any charges against her because Epstein was dead.
42:42
Speaker 1: They couldn't go any further. What are they going to
42:44
Speaker 1: do if you don't have Epstein, you don't have anything.
42:52
Speaker 1: In her lawyer's depiction, Groff did nothing, saw nothing, and
42:54
Speaker 1: knew nothing. Her ignorance was so total that it seemed
42:58
Speaker 1: to take on solid form and close like a reinforced
43:01
Speaker 1: ill chamber built to withstand attack. Yeah, that sounds about right.
43:07
Speaker 1: Simplicity is elusive and slippery, not easily witnessed or proved.
43:11
Speaker 1: The accomplice is not the leading actor, but a figure
43:14
Speaker 1: in the shadows. In his book Complicit, the Berkeley Professor
43:18
Speaker 1: of Law Christopher Cutz describes how an individual can only
43:22
Speaker 1: be charged with a crime of complicity co conspiracy or
43:25
Speaker 1: aiding and a betting say if their actions independently meet
43:27
Speaker 1: criteria of criminality. Prosecutors have decided that Groff's actions were
43:32
Speaker 1: not crimes in themselves because they didn't charge Rico. How
43:37
Speaker 1: do you miss that? Did mister Cuts not talk about
43:39
Speaker 1: that in his book? If Groff's complicity is no longer
43:44
Speaker 1: a criminal matter, it remains an ethical one. Groff and
43:47
Speaker 1: the team of pilots, drivers, lawyers, and accountants allowed Epstein
43:51
Speaker 1: machine to run with frictionless continuity. Every individual involved in
43:55
Speaker 1: his life, however small, their tasks, contributed to its operation
43:59
Speaker 1: and its effect. The concept of individual moral accountability is
44:03
Speaker 1: too limited, rights Cuts. When so many serious harms are
44:07
Speaker 1: brought about by multiple people working together. But that doesn't
44:11
Speaker 1: absolve the individual. Something being a collective responsibility does not
44:15
Speaker 1: entail that it's not an individual responsibility. Well, no, they
44:19
Speaker 1: all had their role to play. They all played their roles,
44:22
Speaker 1: they did it well, and they all did it in
44:24
Speaker 1: furtherance of the criminal enterprise. And if that's not Rico,
44:27
Speaker 1: I have no idea. What is Grath then, was one
44:30
Speaker 1: of many enablers of Epstein. Enabling abuse is not a crime,
44:34
Speaker 1: but Amos Gooria, a law professor at the University of Utah,
44:38
Speaker 1: is now lobbying multiple countries to make it one. Goria
44:43
Speaker 1: is the son of Holocaust survivors. His first book was
44:46
Speaker 1: about the concept of the bystander, the person who watches
44:49
Speaker 1: a crime take place in front of them and does nothing,
44:52
Speaker 1: such as those who taunted his father with water while
44:56
Speaker 1: he was on a death march in the former Yugoslavia.
44:59
Speaker 1: We already have the I don't know what this author's
45:01
Speaker 1: talking about, Rico, that's what it was created for. Look
45:06
Speaker 1: up the statutes police. In his second book, Armies of Enablers,
45:09
Speaker 1: he wrote about how those enabled the sexual abuse perpetrated by,
45:13
Speaker 1: among others, the United States national team gymnastics coach Larry
45:17
Speaker 1: Nasser at Michigan State university and Catholic priests in Boston.
45:22
Speaker 1: In every case, there were people who allowed the abuse
45:24
Speaker 1: to continue, either by protecting the abuser, the institution, or
45:28
Speaker 1: ignoring victim's reports. They knew what was happening, even if
45:32
Speaker 1: they never witnessed it taking place and did nothing for
45:36
Speaker 1: Goerra Groff is a classic case. If she was making
45:39
Speaker 1: appointments and booking flights, she was enabling all this shit
45:43
Speaker 1: can't happen without her. In that sense, she was very
45:45
Speaker 1: like the leaders in Catholic Church or the university administrators,
45:49
Speaker 1: who put their loyalty to their institutions over the duty
45:52
Speaker 1: to a victim. This is all incorrect. Those were institutions right.
45:57
Speaker 1: Epstein was running a criminal enterprise. It wasn't the Catholic Church.
46:01
Speaker 1: Everything that was happening was benefiting Epstein directly, and all
46:05
Speaker 1: these lieutenants and all these people play their part to
46:07
Speaker 1: make that happen. No different from the mafia. The only
46:14
Speaker 1: difference was that in Groff's case, said Gioria, her institution
46:18
Speaker 1: was Jeffrey Epstein. When asked what Groff knew of Epstein's crimes,
46:22
Speaker 1: Backner said, it's our strong position that Epstein purposely kept
46:26
Speaker 1: Leslie isolated from his criminal conduct since he had no
46:28
Speaker 1: reason to confide in her and every reason to lie.
46:32
Speaker 1: Epstein lived in two worlds, one legitimate and the other not,
46:35
Speaker 1: and made sure they did not collide. Leslie now realizes
46:39
Speaker 1: that Epstein made her a face of his legitimate world.
46:43
Speaker 1: It's no wonder she was included on so many emails. YO,
46:46
Speaker 1: these people are seriously demented, Leslie. Groff is no victim here.
46:50
Speaker 1: I'm sorry she is not. For some of Epstein's victims.
46:54
Speaker 1: Groff's behavior speaks for itself. She was the person who
46:58
Speaker 1: arranged their appointments, booked their flight, and pay their money.
47:01
Speaker 1: They were all deeply involved. Renad O told me they
47:04
Speaker 1: can't deny they were enabling. Juliette Bryant wondered if Groff
47:08
Speaker 1: and her colleagues convinced themselves that the girls were models
47:11
Speaker 1: visiting from overseas, rather than entertain the idea that Epstein
47:15
Speaker 1: had constructed a system of international sex trafficking. More likely,
47:19
Speaker 1: she thought Groff knew something was going on, but chose
47:22
Speaker 1: not to think about it. A lot of people don't
47:25
Speaker 1: ask questions. Does it mean you're not culpable? Is your
47:29
Speaker 1: name on it? Did you send the emails? Did you
47:31
Speaker 1: set the girls up? Sorry? Culpable? Among Graff's emails are
47:34
Speaker 1: hundreds between her and Dike, which reveal a wholesome domestic life,
47:38
Speaker 1: far removed from the incessant demands of her work. They
47:42
Speaker 1: planned dinners and discuss house renovations, the bank loan, and
47:45
Speaker 1: decisions about pain colors and windows styles. They figure out playdates,
47:49
Speaker 1: football practice timings, and summer camps for their son, and
47:53
Speaker 1: worry about how much time he spending on social media.
47:57
Speaker 1: Groff comes across as a mother devoted to her child
47:59
Speaker 1: in the ordinary consuming way, and that makes it worse.
48:02
Speaker 1: In my opinion. Your kid gets doted on while other
48:05
Speaker 1: kids were abused. Way to go mom. She worked from
48:08
Speaker 1: home when she could to have more time with them,
48:11
Speaker 1: and made sure she was home for the day that
48:12
Speaker 1: he started the third grade. In an email to a
48:16
Speaker 1: pregnant former colleague, Groff tells her to enjoy every minute
48:19
Speaker 1: as it was the best, best, best part of my life.
48:23
Speaker 1: Time passed so quickly, and she found herself crying when
48:25
Speaker 1: she looked at photos of her son when he was little.
48:29
Speaker 1: Having a child was, she wrote, the most amazing thing
48:32
Speaker 1: you will ever experience. Hey, Leslie, quick question. Do you
48:35
Speaker 1: think that the families, the parents of the survivors, felt
48:38
Speaker 1: any different? Maybe you should have thought about those kids
48:41
Speaker 1: when your boss was doing what your boss was doing.
48:45
Speaker 1: After a while, clicking on email after email, I felt
48:48
Speaker 1: I was reading things I shouldn't. I found myself in
48:50
Speaker 1: the private enclosure of Groff's mind, her family and home,
48:54
Speaker 1: the details of a life she kept separate from her job,
48:57
Speaker 1: the train she was going to take home, the burger
48:59
Speaker 1: she'd make, the voluntary work she wanted her son to
49:02
Speaker 1: take part in. And yet reading these intimacies also revealed
49:07
Speaker 1: the extent to which someone can divide their life intwo.
49:10
Speaker 1: It's possible to have everyday concerns, to care deeply for
49:13
Speaker 1: the people you love, and to willingly work for a
49:16
Speaker 1: terrible man who does terrible things. There was nothing exceptional
49:20
Speaker 1: or particular about Groff that made her able to do this.
49:23
Speaker 1: Anyone could have had their cv plucked from a pile
49:26
Speaker 1: and done exactly as she did. We like to think,
49:29
Speaker 1: from the safety of not being in her position, that
49:32
Speaker 1: we would have done things differently, but the capacity to
49:34
Speaker 1: close our eyes the horror is surely near universal. The
49:38
Speaker 1: fuck it is I've spent every day for the last
49:41
Speaker 1: seven years railing about this, and I promise you I'm
49:44
Speaker 1: not making money, not like Leslie Groff, So save the
49:47
Speaker 1: every woman act for somebody else. That's a bunch of bs.
49:52
Speaker 1: And yet there's still the question of why she did
49:55
Speaker 1: it for so long when I put this question a backner,
49:57
Speaker 1: he replied. Although Leslie considered a res Epstein liked to manipulate,
50:02
Speaker 1: and he persuaded her less stay, she was awestruck by
50:06
Speaker 1: the quality of the company that continued to surround Epstein
50:09
Speaker 1: after his conviction, including heads of state, philanthropists, scientists, philosophers,
50:14
Speaker 1: past and president elected officials, and men of women of
50:17
Speaker 1: universal approbation. That's always the excuse. Everybody else was doing it,
50:23
Speaker 1: so I might as well too. I don't buy that either,
50:26
Speaker 1: garbage save it. Regrettably, Leslie, like so many others, was
50:30
Speaker 1: misled by Epstein and those complicit with him. Later in
50:34
Speaker 1: the statement, Bagner added, Leslie wishes she had never met
50:37
Speaker 1: Epstein and that she had resigned instead. Her life has
50:41
Speaker 1: been turned upside down, including being viciously threatened simply for
50:44
Speaker 1: doing her job as a secretary for a command who
50:48
Speaker 1: intentionally misled her, and kept her isolated from his criminal conduct. Listen,
50:52
Speaker 1: nobody should be threatening Leslie Groff or anybody else. The
50:55
Speaker 1: idea is to force the government into action. That's the idea.
51:02
Speaker 1: Whatever Groff knew, it seems she seriously questioned what Epstein
51:06
Speaker 1: was doing or her part in it. Perhaps, as Groff
51:09
Speaker 1: performed her role as social prestices, she felt her actions
51:13
Speaker 1: no longer belonged to her, but were simply an execution
51:16
Speaker 1: of his will. It didn't matter what she thought about
51:19
Speaker 1: what she did, because it was not her job to think,
51:22
Speaker 1: only to enact as desires. This is not to excuse
51:26
Speaker 1: what she did or didn't do, but an attempt to
51:28
Speaker 1: understand how someone can split themselves between two moral planes.
51:32
Speaker 1: To understand how someone who worries about the amount of
51:35
Speaker 1: time their child spends on their phone might spend years
51:38
Speaker 1: arranging girls to see a man convicted of abusing children.
51:42
Speaker 1: And to understand why in all that time she didn't
51:45
Speaker 1: walk away. Are you for real? Let me help you out. Money?
51:50
Speaker 1: That's why. Money, That's what it all comes down to.
51:54
Speaker 1: When Graff goes to Washington on June ninth, she will
51:57
Speaker 1: not be the first of Epstein's former employees to appear
52:00
Speaker 1: in front of the House Committee. His accountant, Richard Kahan
52:03
Speaker 1: and lawyer Darren Endyke were both interviewed in early March.
52:07
Speaker 1: Cohn said he made the wrong decision in continuing to
52:09
Speaker 1: work for Epstein after two thousand and eight, but there
52:12
Speaker 1: was a financial crisis and he had a family to support.
52:15
Speaker 1: Money like usual, that's what they'll all say, money, money, money,
52:19
Speaker 1: money in Dyke said he had no knowledge whatsoever of
52:25
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein's wrongdoings while he was working for him. Khan
52:29
Speaker 1: also spoke of the toll it had taken on his family,
52:31
Speaker 1: said his reputation had been dragged through the mud, a
52:34
Speaker 1: situation that did not seem to elicit great sympathy. A
52:38
Speaker 1: Democratic representative, James Walkinshaw, hughes Khan of being wilfully ignorant.
52:44
Speaker 1: That's being nice, that's being nice. I'm sorry you can't
52:49
Speaker 1: be as close to Epstein as Indike and con were
52:51
Speaker 1: and not know. I'm climbing all the way to the
52:54
Speaker 1: top of Mount Everest and screaming bullshit for that one.
52:57
Speaker 1: The interviews offered no great revelation or a cathar, but
53:00
Speaker 1: they did paint a picture of the odd suspended existence
53:04
Speaker 1: of all those closely connected to Epstein who have evaded
53:07
Speaker 1: formal accountability. They might never be found guilty of a crime,
53:11
Speaker 1: but they can't escape the shadow of association with the man.
53:14
Speaker 1: They live instead in the purgatory of undefined suspicion, where
53:19
Speaker 1: the best that can be hoped for is the impossible,
53:22
Speaker 1: a life out of sight, their name forgotten, the past rewritten,
53:27
Speaker 1: or maybe just come forward and tell everybody what you'd know.
53:31
Speaker 1: It's wild that they think anyone's going to feel sorry
53:34
Speaker 1: for these people. During her last weeks of working for Epstein,
53:39
Speaker 1: Groff handled the usual range of tasks. Flights were booked
53:43
Speaker 1: four redacted from San Francisco to Hong Kong. A propane
53:46
Speaker 1: delivery at Epstein's island needed chasing. There was a back
53:49
Speaker 1: and forth on who was keeping a copy of some boatlogs.
53:52
Speaker 1: Groff wasn't sure of the necessity of this, but the
53:55
Speaker 1: fact Jeffrey asked about it means something. On July fifth,
53:59
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, Groff emailed Epstein and various colleagues about a
54:04
Speaker 1: man called Pokey who was supposed to have arrived on
54:06
Speaker 1: the island. He said he could be there seven am.
54:09
Speaker 1: Last we heard. She wrote, can you confirm Epstein? Meanwhile
54:13
Speaker 1: email Groff and others complaining about malfunctioning windows which were
54:17
Speaker 1: meant to swovel past each other, so the entire window
54:20
Speaker 1: is open. The next day, Epstein would fly on his
54:23
Speaker 1: private jet from Paris to Teterborough, New Jersey, where he
54:27
Speaker 1: was arrested on charges of sex trafficking miners. There was
54:30
Speaker 1: no sign in the emails as Groff worried about Pokey's
54:33
Speaker 1: no show that our boss, entire criminal edifice was on
54:36
Speaker 1: the verge of collapse. It was just another day with
54:40
Speaker 1: a mixture of administrative demands and the endless effort to
54:44
Speaker 1: make one man's life unfold minute to minute exactly as
54:47
Speaker 1: he wished. Another employee replied to say that Pokey wasn't
54:51
Speaker 1: answering his phone. Groff, not one to back down from
54:55
Speaker 1: pressing tasks in front of a roboss, issued an instruction
54:58
Speaker 1: keep trying. So look, folks, I get it, Leslie. Groff
55:02
Speaker 1: certainly wasn't abusing anybody, and I've never thought that, but
55:07
Speaker 1: if you look at it through the lens of Rico,
55:09
Speaker 1: there is no doubt that she was complicit. But unfortunately
55:13
Speaker 1: this is not a Rico case and considering that, I
55:16
Speaker 1: don't see how they could charge Leslie Groff with anything really,
55:19
Speaker 1: So it's going to be interesting to see what she
55:20
Speaker 1: has to say when she appears before a Congress. But
55:23
Speaker 1: I just don't know how far they're going to be
55:25
Speaker 1: able to get when it comes to trying to get
55:28
Speaker 1: to the bottom of what was going on. So it's
55:30
Speaker 1: going to be interesting to see what she has to
55:32
Speaker 1: say when she makes her appearance before Congress, And like usual,
55:36
Speaker 1: we'll be right here every step of the way. All
55:39
Speaker 1: the information that goes with this episode can be found
55:42
Speaker 1: in the description box.