Latest / The Vault: The Epstein Files / FirstBank Puerto Rico Moves to Dismiss Epstein Victim’s Lawsuit (8/3/26)

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FirstBank Puerto Rico Moves to Dismiss Epstein Victim’s Lawsuit (8/3/26) · The Vault: The Epstein Files

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Epstein Chronicles. A couple of months ago, some Epstein survivors
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: got together and they filed a lawsuit against several different banks,
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  Speaker 1: and one of those banks was the First Bank of
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  Speaker 1: Puerto Rico. Well, now the First Bank of Puerto Rico
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  Speaker 1: is moving to dismiss that lawsuit, and they're claiming that
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  Speaker 1: the court doesn't have the jurisdiction it needs to pursue
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  Speaker 1: a lawsuit against them, And of course the survivors lawyers
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  Speaker 1: have pushed back and called that complete bs. So today
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  Speaker 1: we have an article from the Saint Thomas Horse and
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  Speaker 1: the headline First Bank Puerto Rico moves to dismiss Epstein
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  Speaker 1: victim's lawsuit. This article was authored by C and Cobb.
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  Speaker 1: First Bank Puerto Rico has asked a New York federal
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  Speaker 1: court to dismiss a civil complaint alleging it aid to
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  Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking operation, arguing that the court lacks
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  Speaker 1: jurisdiction and the lawsuit provides no evidence that the bank
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  Speaker 1: had any knowledge of or participated in the convicted sex
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  Speaker 1: offender's scheme. No, they had no idea what they forget
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  Speaker 1: to leave out is that they had an idea, they
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  Speaker 1: just ignored it. When you have a bank like this,
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  Speaker 1: there's all kinds of regulation. You should have multiple layers
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  Speaker 1: of protection when it comes to people that are engaged
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  Speaker 1: in fraud, money laundering, whatever it might be. And the
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  Speaker 1: simple fact is the vast majority of these banks bypass
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  Speaker 1: those safeguards so that they can continue to do business
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  Speaker 1: with Jeffrey Epstein. And that's because the juice to them
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  Speaker 1: was worth the squeeze, all the people Epstein could bring aboard,
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  Speaker 1: all the money that he was moving through the bank,
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  Speaker 1: and all the pockets that he was filling. First Banks
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  Speaker 1: thirty three page memorandum supporting its motion to dis and
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  Speaker 1: it's The suit brought last month by an Epstein victim
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  Speaker 1: proceeding anonymously and identified only as Jane Doe, was filed
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  Speaker 1: late Thursday in District Court for the Southern District of
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  Speaker 1: New York. The case is assigned to Judge Jed Raykoff,
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  Speaker 1: who's presided over several other civil suits by Epstein victims
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  Speaker 1: against the banks they say enabled them, as well as
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  Speaker 1: the Virgin Islands complaint against JP Morgan Chase that resulted
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  Speaker 1: in a seventy five million dollars settlement in September of
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. So Judge Raykoff, as you all know,
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  Speaker 1: has some experience with this, and so far he hasn't
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  Speaker 1: been very friendly to the banks. So I don't know
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  Speaker 1: if First Bank is going to be successful here with
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  Speaker 1: their jurisdictional argument, but it's pretty much all they have
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  Speaker 1: to go on. Right when you don't have the evidence
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  Speaker 1: or the facts backing you up, it becomes a battle
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  Speaker 1: of loopholes and technicalities. And it's not just obviously the
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  Speaker 1: First Bank of Puerto Rico that's doing this. That's what
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  Speaker 1: most of these corporations do, whether it has to do
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  Speaker 1: with Epstein or not. Those represented by Boys, Schiller and
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  Speaker 1: Flexner LLP of New York and Bradley Jay Edwards of Florida,
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  Speaker 1: the same firms that have won settlements for scores of
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  Speaker 1: Epstein victims, including against his estate, which is headquartered in
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  Speaker 1: the US Virgin Islands. First Bank Puerto Rico and its
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  Speaker 1: parent company, First Bank Corp. Are represented by Holland and
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  Speaker 1: Knight LLP and William Cutler, Pickering, Hell and Door LLP.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, how many more partners do you need on
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  Speaker 1: the name Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hall and Door LLP. Everybody
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  Speaker 1: has to have their name on the firm wall. What
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  Speaker 1: I think they're missing is another nighbor to noting First
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  Speaker 1: Bank's long relationship with Epstein from around nineteen ninety eight
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  Speaker 1: through twenty twenty after his All Gifts twenty nineteen deaths
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  Speaker 1: while in federal custody on sex trafficking charges. Dawes lawsuit
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  Speaker 1: accuses the Institution of participating in and financially benefiting from
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  Speaker 1: the disgraced Financiers International Trafficking Operation for more than two
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  Speaker 1: decades in violation of the Trafficking Victim Protection Act and
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  Speaker 1: the New York City Gender Motivated Violence Protection Act. So
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  Speaker 1: that's why they're claiming the jurisdictional issue, because they're trying
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  Speaker 1: to use New York laws against a bank that's based
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  Speaker 1: in Puerto Rico. So that's where the jurisdiction comes in. Now,
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  Speaker 1: of course, there's going to be loopholes and technicalities as
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  Speaker 1: well as it continues to move forward, because there always are.
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  Speaker 1: My guess they'll eventually settle for how much I don't know,
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  Speaker 1: but that's been the mo As a result, First Bank
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  Speaker 1: acquired a plethora of information that could have put Epstein
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  Speaker 1: in prison years earlier if it had simply properly reported
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  Speaker 1: what it knew to the authorities, According the ninety one
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  Speaker 1: page complaint, instead, it chose to profit to the detriment
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  Speaker 1: of hundreds of victims, it says. For example, a US
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  Speaker 1: Treasury Department report referenced in the complaint noted that from
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  Speaker 1: two thousand and three to twenty nineteen, there were more
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  Speaker 1: than four thousand, seven hundred and twenty five wire transfers
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  Speaker 1: totaling one point eight billion, involving Epstein and dissociates, including
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  Speaker 1: his attorney Darren Endyke, accountants Harry Beller and Richard Kahn,
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  Speaker 1: and the US Virgin Islands tax attorney Erica Keller Halls.
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  Speaker 1: And if you were wondering why they didn't hit them
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  Speaker 1: with RICO, this is why I'll just point it out again,
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  Speaker 1: because nobody wants to talk about it for whatever reason.
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  Speaker 1: But the truth is, if they would have just used RICO,
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  Speaker 1: all these people would have been caught up, including a
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  Speaker 1: guy like Ted Wade. You're going to send seven million
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  Speaker 1: dollars to somebody who's engaging in a criminal conspiracy. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: if you were related to El Chappo and El chop
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  Speaker 1: Will sent you that money. How do you think the
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  Speaker 1: government would have reacted? So what's the difference? I'll tell
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  Speaker 1: you there is no difference besides the fact that Jeffrey
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  Speaker 1: Epstein was friends with some very very powerful people. First
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  Speaker 1: Bank of Puerto Rico fortully disputes that characterization, saying those
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  Speaker 1: complaint provides no evidence that any of its employees had
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  Speaker 1: any sort of relationship or direct involvement with Epstein, let
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  Speaker 1: alone contemporaneous knowledge of trafficking. While the lawsuit cites the
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  Speaker 1: two thousand and three Vanity Fair story and news reports
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  Speaker 1: when he was convicted of soliciting a minor for prostitution
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  Speaker 1: in two thousand and eight and Florida earning him a
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  Speaker 1: place on the Sex offender or registry, the bank said
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  Speaker 1: that there is no evidence that any of its employees
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  Speaker 1: knew of or saw those articles at the time. Boy,
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  Speaker 1: that is a weak ass argument. You mean to tell
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  Speaker 1: me that nobody in your regulation department had any idea
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  Speaker 1: who you were doing business with. That is a problem
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  Speaker 1: unto itself. So how many other unknown scumbags are banking
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  Speaker 1: at First Bank Puerto Rico as we speak? Does a
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  Speaker 1: full audit need to be conducted, I would say, so
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  Speaker 1: will that happen? Of course not, but it should. Moreover,
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  Speaker 1: it had a legitimate reason for keeping Epstein's accounts open
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  Speaker 1: after his twenty nineteen arrest, including compliance with criminal activity
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  Speaker 1: leans and account freezes by law enforcement. The bank states
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  Speaker 1: it also filed a Suspicious Activity Report or SAR, noting
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  Speaker 1: one point seven million dollars in suspicious transactions just eleven
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  Speaker 1: days after the arrest. That filing demonstrates assistance to law
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  Speaker 1: enforcement as soon as the bank became aware of an investigation,
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  Speaker 1: not obstruction. It says. The ideal with sars is to
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  Speaker 1: use them previous to all this happening, so that Finsen
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  Speaker 1: the Financial Regulatory Board can be aware of what's going on.
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  Speaker 1: So if you do it retroactively, then who are you
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  Speaker 1: helping besides yourself? And if you don't do it in
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  Speaker 1: a timely manner like right away, then you're in violation.
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  Speaker 1: And there's literally no gray area here. We're talking about
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  Speaker 1: Title thirty one laws. Folks. First Bank is at least
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  Speaker 1: a fifth financial institution to be targeted by the same
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  Speaker 1: group of plaintiff lawyers over alleged links to Jeffrey Epstein.
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  Speaker 1: The three hundred and nineteen paragraph complaint cuts and pace
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  Speaker 1: from those past pleadings and had the benefit of three
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  Speaker 1: point five million pages of publicly released documents pursuant to
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  Speaker 1: the Epstein Files Transparency Act that was passed by Congress
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  Speaker 1: and signed into law last November. According to the memorandum,
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  Speaker 1: as a result, the complaint is filled with allegations of
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  Speaker 1: misconduct by other entities, but short on one key ingredient
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  Speaker 1: fact sufficient the state of claim against First Bank. It says, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I have my doubts. Okay, I have my doubts, and
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  Speaker 1: I think that First Bank is sounding a whole lot
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  Speaker 1: like JP Morgan right now. Remember how JP Morgan was
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  Speaker 1: carrying on at first. We're never going to settle. We're
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  Speaker 1: going to see this out till the end. We did
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  Speaker 1: nothing wrong. What did they end up doing? I have
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  Speaker 1: a funny feeling that's what we're going to see here too.
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  Speaker 1: The few facts it does include show that First Bank
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  Speaker 1: provided routine banking services that cannot support claims under the
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  Speaker 1: Trafficking Victims Protection Act or the New York City Gender
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  Speaker 1: Motivated Violence Protection Act. This deficiency is fatal and the
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  Speaker 1: complaint should be dismissed with prejudice. It says, by comparison,
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  Speaker 1: the Epstein victim's successful suit against Deutsche Bank relied on
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  Speaker 1: allegations at a JP Morgan affiliate actually trafficked women and
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  Speaker 1: girls on a company aircraft that it ignored oversight measures
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  Speaker 1: imposed by its own risk committee, facilitated transfers to non
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  Speaker 1: co conspirators, and provided Epstein to one hundred thousand per
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  Speaker 1: year in cash through services characterized as far from routine,
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  Speaker 1: according to the memorandum. Likewise, a claim against Bank of
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  Speaker 1: America survived because it allegedly provided direct banking services to
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  Speaker 1: a trafficking victim despite having every reason to know that
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  Speaker 1: the victim had no ability to earn legitimate income in
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  Speaker 1: the United States, and serviced MC two or MC squared,
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  Speaker 1: a modeling agency used to recruit victims, despite suspicious and
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  Speaker 1: non routine circumstances, It says. The complaint against First Bank
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  Speaker 1: alleges nothing comparable. The memorandum concludes, I have a funny
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  Speaker 1: feeling the court is going to feel differently when all
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  Speaker 1: said and done. I think the court's going to feel differently,
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  Speaker 1: and that's because this bank was obviously a plan ball
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  Speaker 1: with Epstein. The question is to what level at most
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  Speaker 1: plantiff provides conclusiony allegations at Epstein received an undefined preferred
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  Speaker 1: customer designation, had certain routine fees waived, and opened accounts.
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  Speaker 1: Those allegations describe ordinary customer service, not extraordinary or specially
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  Speaker 1: tailored assistants. The bank states any First Bank customer with
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  Speaker 1: a similar balance would have automatically received the same routine treatment.
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  Speaker 1: It says, unable to allege participation through any kind of
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  Speaker 1: direct or active engagement, Dough largely repackages the same theory.
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  Speaker 1: This court has previously rejected that processing allegedly suspicious transactions
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  Speaker 1: by itself constitutes participation. According to the memorandum, allegations concerning
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  Speaker 1: transfers to First Bank customers and em Rodriguez, who manage
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  Speaker 1: Little Saint James Epstein's private island off Saint Thomas, and
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  Speaker 1: former First Lady Cecial DeJong, his longtime office manager, fair
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  Speaker 1: no better. The bank says, the complaint does not allege
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  Speaker 1: that either recipient was a trafficking victim, recruiter, co conspirator,
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  Speaker 1: or a participant in any alleged trafficking venture, nor does
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  Speaker 1: it allege facts suggesting that either transfer was processed in
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  Speaker 1: a non routine way, funded trafficking activity, or otherwise furthered
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  Speaker 1: the alleged venture. At most. Plaintiff alleges that transfers should
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  Speaker 1: have been viewed as suspicious because they involved round dollar amounts.
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  Speaker 1: These transfers, like the rest of Plaintiff's allegations, are insufficient
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  Speaker 1: to establish active participation, the memorandum states. In fact, the
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  Speaker 1: list of Epstein's accounts detailed in the complaint comes from
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  Speaker 1: a First Bank letter that demonstrates the bank's compliance with
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  Speaker 1: a law enforcement subpoena, proving that it did not obstruct
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  Speaker 1: the law. It says, I think the real question is
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  Speaker 1: how many stars did they file and when did they
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  Speaker 1: file them? And if they weren't filed regularly leading up
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  Speaker 1: to Jeffrey Epstein's death and arrest, then I think that
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  Speaker 1: their argument is doa because if you didn't file those stars,
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  Speaker 1: then you weren't doing your job. At bottom, the complaint
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  Speaker 1: alleges that, knowing anything or everything we do now, First
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  Speaker 1: Bank should have done more to prevent Epstein's crimes, but
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  Speaker 1: obstruction cannot be pled in hindsight. An obstruction claim requires
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  Speaker 1: knowing interference with the law enforcement investigation. Here, there are
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  Speaker 1: no facts suggesting anyone at First Bank was even aware
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  Speaker 1: of an effort to enforce the TVPA from two thousand
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  Speaker 1: and eight to Epstein's twenty nineteen arrest, and a allegation
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  Speaker 1: that once it became aware, the bank did anything other
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  Speaker 1: than aid the investigation by filing us are and responding
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  Speaker 1: to subpoenas the memorandum states. According to the court docket,
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  Speaker 1: those opposition to First Bank's motion to dismiss is due
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  Speaker 1: August thirteenth, and First Bank has until August twentieth to reply.
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  Speaker 1: So this is in the early stages and we have
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  Speaker 1: no idea how it's going to end up. So what
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  Speaker 1: we'll do, like usual is follow along and when we
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  Speaker 1: have some more information one way or the other will
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  Speaker 1: get that added to the catalog. All the information that
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: goes with this episode mode can be found in the
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  Speaker 1: description box