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Jeffrey Epstein And His Shining Starr · The Epstein Chronicles

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Let's jump into this article from The Guardian and authored
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: by Ed Pilkington. Headline, Ken Starr helped Jeffrey Epstein with
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: scorched earth campaign book claims. Ken Starr, the lawyer who
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: hounded Bill Clinton over his affair with Monica Lewinsky. What
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: do you mean? Okay, let's be very, let's be very clear.
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  Speaker 1: That was his job in that regard, right? His job
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  Speaker 1: was to hound Bill Clinton, the special prosecutor, no different
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  Speaker 1: than Mueller. Waged a scorched earth legal campaign to persuade
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  Speaker 1: federal prosecutors to drop sex trafficking case against the billionaire financier, pedophile,
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  Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein, relating to the abuse of multiple underage girls,
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  Speaker 1: according to a new book. It shouldn't shock you. Well,
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  Speaker 1: you don't think that a guy like, um, Ken Starr
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  Speaker 1: had a direct line to somebody like Mukasey? Of course
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  Speaker 1: he did. And that's why the whole Alex Acosta thing
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  Speaker 1: cracks me up. When people go all in, like Alex
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  Speaker 1: Acosta had the ability or the power to make this
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  Speaker 1: decision on his own. Yeah, right. There are so many
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  Speaker 1: different levels to this shit, folks. And lawyers like Ken Starr,
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  Speaker 1: Alan Dershowitz, and the rest of them, they are paid
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  Speaker 1: for who they know, not for what they do in
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  Speaker 1: the courtroom. In Perversion of Justice, the Miami Herald reporter
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  Speaker 1: Julie K. Brown writes about Starr's role in securing the
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  Speaker 1: secret 2008 sweetheart deal that granted Epstein effective immunity from
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  Speaker 1: federal prosecution. The author, who is credited with blowing up
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  Speaker 1: the cover-up, calls Starr a fixer. who used his political
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  Speaker 1: connections in the White House to get the Justice Department
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  Speaker 1: to review Epstein's case. So right there alone, that shows you,
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  Speaker 1: that tells you that Alex Acosta was nothing more than
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  Speaker 1: a talking head here. The Justice Department review the case. Oh,
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  Speaker 1: who's the head of the Justice Department at the time?
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  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's right, Mukasey. I don't know why people
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  Speaker 1: want to let people off. I don't know why people
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: are looking for mid-level associates here. Don't you want to
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  Speaker 1: go to the top and get the real people who
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: made these decisions? Go after the people who gave the okay,
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  Speaker 1: signed on the dotted line? I'm not happy with just Acosta. See,
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: that's the difference. I want to go sport fishing, folks.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: You might be happy with catching a couple mackerels and,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: you know, a sea bass, right? Not me. I want
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  Speaker 1: a swordfish. I want something to mount on our wall.
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  Speaker 1: The book says that emails and letters sent by Starr
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  Speaker 1: and Epstein's then criminal defense lawyer Jay Lefkowitz show that
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  Speaker 1: the duo were campaigning to pressure the Justice Department to
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  Speaker 1: drop the case. Starr had been brought into center stage
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  Speaker 1: of Epstein's legal team because of his connections in Washington
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  Speaker 1: to the Bush administration. Oh wait, didn't I just tell
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  Speaker 1: you that? Didn't I just say that? Haven't I been
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  Speaker 1: saying that from the beginning? It's all about nepotism. It's
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  Speaker 1: all about who you know. What sort of... connections you
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  Speaker 1: can bring to the table. You think these guys are
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  Speaker 1: getting paid $ 1, 500 an hour because of the legalese of
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  Speaker 1: the issue? Hell, all the lawyers know the legal aspect
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  Speaker 1: of this shit. It's about how you hustle. It's about
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  Speaker 1: how you run your mouth behind the scenes. And it's
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  Speaker 1: about the people you know and the pressure you can exert.
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  Speaker 1: And somebody like Ken Starr, who had a line into
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  Speaker 1: the Bush family, right into the Bush White House, right
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  Speaker 1: to George Bush himself, I'm sure. Well, that's the perfect
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  Speaker 1: guy to employ if you're looking to get off, right?
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  Speaker 1: If you're looking to buy connections, perfect guy to buy, right?
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  Speaker 1: Guy shows up. Hey, look, fellas, you guys know me, right?
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  Speaker 1: I'm Ken Starr. Look, my client really is not that bad.
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  Speaker 1: This is a very rich man, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
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  Speaker 1: Why don't we just give him a little slap on
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  Speaker 1: the wrist here? Let's punt it down to state charges, huh?
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  Speaker 1: And if you think Acosta made that decision, you are
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  Speaker 1: sorely mistaken. Now, he could have tried to stop it,
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  Speaker 1: and that's why I think he's the biggest scumbag, you know,
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  Speaker 1: or a big scumbag. You don't just get along to
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  Speaker 1: go along with something like that. If something is wrong,
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  Speaker 1: something is out of line, step up and do the
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  Speaker 1: right thing. But unfortunately, there's not enough of that from
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  Speaker 1: these prosecutors, from these journalists. I get it, man. Everybody
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  Speaker 1: wants to secure their future. Everybody wants a paycheck. Not
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: everybody wants to go balls out. But maybe you're in
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  Speaker 1: the wrong professions. Maybe what we need are some prosecutors
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  Speaker 1: willing to go balls out. Maybe what we need are
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  Speaker 1: some journalists who are willing to chase the story wherever
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  Speaker 1: the evidence leads. Because, folks, we sure don't have enough
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  Speaker 1: of that. Perversion of Justice will be published next week.
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  Speaker 1: The Guardian obtained a copy. When Epstein's lawyers appeared to
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  Speaker 1: be failing in their pressure campaign with senior DOJ officials...
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: concluding that Epstein was ripe for federal prosecution, Starr pulled
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  Speaker 1: out all the stops. Brown discloses that he wrote an
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  Speaker 1: eight-page letter to Mark Philippe, who had just been confirmed
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  Speaker 1: as Deputy U.S. Attorney General, the second most powerful prosecutor
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  Speaker 1: in the country. Now, we've talked about Philippe as well,
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  Speaker 1: a lot actually, and Philippe is the man whose signature
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  Speaker 1: ended up on those documents that gave him the non-prosecution agreement.
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  Speaker 1: But again, Mukasey was the top dog. Mukasey. You really
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  Speaker 1: think that this didn't go through Mukasey's office? Of course
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  Speaker 1: it did. Him and Philippe are the real people who
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  Speaker 1: should be focused on. That's where the spotlight should be blasted.
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  Speaker 1: We've already aired out all Acosta's bitch ass. Why isn't
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  Speaker 1: anybody airing out Mukasey or going after Philippe? It's always
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  Speaker 1: the low hanging fruit, right? It's always the fall guy. quote-unquote,
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  Speaker 1: that they look to go after, and then they seem
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  Speaker 1: to be satisfied. See, the difference is, I'm not just
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  Speaker 1: trying to eat tonight, folks. I want to have a
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  Speaker 1: whole entire storeroom worth of food. So let's dig deeper,
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  Speaker 1: much deeper than just the surface level. All of these
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  Speaker 1: people are connected with each other. And I don't mean
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  Speaker 1: some backroom conglomerati, okay? You don't even need to do that.
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  Speaker 1: Just take a look at the paperwork that's available and
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  Speaker 1: see whose signature is on it, and that's the person
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  Speaker 1: who gave the okay. Philippe was former colleague of Starr's
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  Speaker 1: at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis. Brown writes that
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  Speaker 1: Starr deployed dramatic language in the letter reminiscent of the
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  Speaker 1: Starr report, his lurid and salacious case against Clinton... that
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  Speaker 1: triggered the president's 1998 impeachment. His lurid and salacious case? No,
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: let's be very clear, okay? Bill Clinton got sculled up
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  Speaker 1: in the Oval Office, used his position of power to
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  Speaker 1: manipulate a young girl into doing it. Impeachment worthy? I
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  Speaker 1: don't think so. But let's not act like Bill Clinton
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  Speaker 1: was some kind of upstanding citizen while he was in
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  Speaker 1: the Oval Office. Let's be very clear with who we're
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  Speaker 1: dealing with here, all right? And again, they try and
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  Speaker 1: paint pictures with their words, and it's so laughable once
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  Speaker 1: you see through the gaslighting. In the letter, Starr begins affably,
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  Speaker 1: invoking the finest traditions of fairness and integrity of the DOJ.
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  Speaker 1: He then goes on to deliver what Brown calls a
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  Speaker 1: brutal punch, accusing prosecutors involved in the Epstein case of
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  Speaker 1: misconduct in trying to engineer a plea deal with the
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  Speaker 1: billionaire that would benefit their friends. So really what he
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: was doing is projecting, right? That's exactly what Epstein was
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  Speaker 1: trying to do. But Starr flipped the script and said
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  Speaker 1: that's what the prosecution was trying to do. The prosecution
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  Speaker 1: was out of line. The prosecution was going after the
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  Speaker 1: wrong man. All because he was just some rich guy.
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  Speaker 1: And this was really out of line. That's the bullshit
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  Speaker 1: these idiots pitched. That's the bullshit people like Mukasey and
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  Speaker 1: Philippe bought. And that's the bullshit people like you and
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: I are chopping in half on a... Brown reports that
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  Speaker 1: Epstein's legal team also went after Marie Villafana, the lead
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  Speaker 1: federal prosecutor in the case, accusing her of similar distorting
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  Speaker 1: negotiations to benefit a friend of her boyfriend, an allegation
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  Speaker 1: she denied. She's a state prosecutor, Villafana. She worked with Krischer. So, again,
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  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna put her up there as some sort
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  Speaker 1: of champion, alright? Was she... somebody who seemed to care
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  Speaker 1: a little bit more, for sure. But at the end
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  Speaker 1: of the day, did she quit her job? Did she
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  Speaker 1: become a whistleblower? Did she do anything like that? She didn't. So, again,
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  Speaker 1: it's nice to have revisionist history and look back at
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  Speaker 1: things and say, oh, well, I knew all along, or,
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  Speaker 1: but you didn't do anything, right? Words are wind. Brownside's
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  Speaker 1: an unnamed prosecutor linked to the 2008 case who said
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: of the legal campaign in which Starr was central, that
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  Speaker 1: it was scorched earth defense like I had never seen before.
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  Speaker 1: Marie broke her back trying to do the right thing,
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  Speaker 1: but someone was always telling her to back off. Well,
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  Speaker 1: if she had steel in her spine she wouldn't have
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  Speaker 1: broken her back but do you really think that as
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  Speaker 1: a lawyer Miss Villafana that you wouldn't have found another
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  Speaker 1: job if you would have just said look I'm not
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  Speaker 1: doing this I quit but yet here we are And
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: people still try and act like she's some kind of
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  Speaker 1: hero in this case. Sorry, I don't buy it, and
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  Speaker 1: I won't get down with that. Now, I don't think
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  Speaker 1: she's a huge villain in this case either, but a hero?
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  Speaker 1: No thank you. The prosecutor added that someone in Washington,
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  Speaker 1: the book does not specify who, was calling shots on
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  Speaker 1: the case. So, again, think about this for a minute, folks.
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  Speaker 1: Julie Brown was insistent about going after Acosta, and she
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  Speaker 1: knew that somebody up top was calling the shots. But
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  Speaker 1: yet Acosta was set up as the man, the guy
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  Speaker 1: who made the decisions. No, he wasn't. Lies of omission,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: Julie Brown, are still lies. Remember that. And while I'm
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  Speaker 1: thankful for all of your hard work on this case,
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  Speaker 1: let's not act like this didn't have a political bend
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  Speaker 1: for you. Villafano warned fellow prosecutors at the time that
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Epstein was probably still abusing underage girls. But according to
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  Speaker 1: an unnamed prosecutor quoted by Brown, it was clear that
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  Speaker 1: she had to find a way to strike a deal
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  Speaker 1: because a decision had already been made not to prosecute Epstein.
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  Speaker 1: So if that's the case and you knew that there
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  Speaker 1: was some kind of sweetheart deal, you don't blow the whistle?
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  Speaker 1: You don't ring the bells of alarm? You wait until
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  Speaker 1: 20 years later and then you say, well, I thought
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  Speaker 1: it was bad, but... Sorry, that's not good enough for me.
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  Speaker 1: All of the people that were in a position to
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  Speaker 1: stop this who didn't, you people are effed, man. And
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: I don't want to hear anything from any of those
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  Speaker 1: kind of people, any excuses about what could have, should have,
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  Speaker 1: or didn't happen. The fact is, you people let this occur.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: You people had a chance to stop this, and you
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  Speaker 1: let it occur. The outcome of this process was a
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  Speaker 1: secret deal that only became public years later, largely through
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  Speaker 1: Brown's own reporting. Given the number of survivors and the
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  Speaker 1: severity of the allegations, Epstein got off exceptionally lightly with
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  Speaker 1: a sentence that saw him serve just 13 months in jail.
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  Speaker 1: During that sentence, Epstein was allowed out to work in
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  Speaker 1: his private office for 12 hours a day, six days
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  Speaker 1: a week, in a breach of jail norms. Now, how
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: many of you have friends who have been to jail?
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: How many of you yourselves have been to jail? You
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: guys get six days out a week? I mean, six
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  Speaker 1: days a week out, go to your job, do whatever
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  Speaker 1: you want? Highly doubt it, right? But Epstein, on the
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  Speaker 1: other hand, got yourself a couple bucks, got yourself a
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  Speaker 1: brand spanking new shiny federal deal. Shit, why not? Must
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  Speaker 1: be nice. And these scumbags act like jail's rough for them. Oh,
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: Ghislaine Maxwell has it so bad. Shut up. In 2018,
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Brown published a three-part expose in the Miami Herald that
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: lifted the lid on the non-prosecution agreement that had been
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: reached covering up Epstein's sex trafficking operation. The reporter managed
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  Speaker 1: to identify 80 potential survivors, some as young as 13
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  Speaker 1: and 14. So one thing I will say is you
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: got to give Julie Brown her props for that, right?
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: definitely did good work bringing this story back to light.
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  Speaker 1: But let's not act like it wasn't a political hit job,
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: because that's exactly what it was. It started with her
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  Speaker 1: going after Acosta. And it mushroomed into this. Following Brown's expose,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: a judge ruled that the secret agreement was illegal, opening
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: up the possibility of a renewed federal prosecution. Epstein was
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: arrested on sex trafficking charges in July 2019. 11 years
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: after Starr and the rest of his legal team had
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: worked so hard to shield him, and died in jail
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: the following month in what was ruled a suicide deal, allegedly.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: In the fallout, Alex Acosta, who, as Miami's top federal
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: prosecutor in 2008, had signed off on the Epstein-Sweetheart deal,
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: was forced to resign as Donald Trump's labor secretary. So, Acosta, again,
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: fall guy. scumbag, no doubt, never deserved a cabinet spot,
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: but let's not act like he was the mastermind behind
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  Speaker 1: all of this. He was the pivot man, right? He
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: was the gopher, the guy that the people in D.C.
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: would call and say, all right, here's the deal. And
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: he ended up being the fall guy as well. Though
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Starr's role in securing the Epstein deal was public knowledge,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Brown's book reveals the lengths that the lawyer was prepared
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: to go in order to protect his client from federal
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: justice and accuse sexual predator and pedophile. The extent of
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: his involvement is all the more striking, given the equally
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: passionate lengths that Starr went to in 1998 to pursue
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: Clinton for perjury and obstruction of justice, given the much
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: less serious sexual activity that sparked that investigation. All right,
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: apples and oranges, okay? Let's not try and engage in
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: revisionist history here, okay? Do I believe the Clinton special
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: prosecutor was warranted? No, I do not. I thought it
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: was ridiculous then. I think it's ridiculous now. But let's
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: not act like he didn't do anything wrong. Bro-Bro flexed
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: his power and got that young girl to do what
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: we all know she did. The response by the Republicans
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: was ridiculous, though. Starr's handling of sexual assault scandals has
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: dogged him during other phases in his career. In 2016,
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: he was stripped of the presidency of Baylor University after
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: the institution under his watch failed to take appropriate action
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: over a sexual assault scandal involving 19 football players and
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: at least 17 women. Four years later, Starr served as
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: a member of Trump's legal team in the former president's
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: first impeachment trial over dealings with Ukraine. So, as you
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: can see, Ken Starr is a traditional scumbag, been around forever,
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: part of the problem, one of those scoundrels that have
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: been lurking in the muck for my whole life, pretty much.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: But what it really goes to show you, and what
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: it should really shine the spotlight on, is when these
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: people are buying these federal attorneys, they're not paying for
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: courtroom behavior. They're paying for relationships and backroom deals. If
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: you'd like to contact me, you can do that at
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: bobbycapucci at protonmail.com. That's B-O-B-B-Y-C-A-P-U-C-C-I at protonmail.com. You can also
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: find me on Twitter at B-O-B-B-Y underscore C-A-P-U-C-C-I. All of
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: the links that go with this episode can be found
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: in the description box.