Latest / The Epstein Chronicles / Lesley Groff and the Administrative Backbone of Epstein’s World (Part 3) (5/29/26)

Transcript

Lesley Groff and the Administrative Backbone of Epstein’s World (Part 3) (5/29/26) · The Epstein Chronicles

0:00
Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
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Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're going to get right
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back to the article about Leslie Groff that was published
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in The Guardian, and the author is Sophie Elmhurst. The
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first time that Groff's name appeared in legal documents connected
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to Epstein's crimes was in the secret plead deal he
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made with the State Attorney's office in South Florida in
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return for federal immunity and immunity for various assistants, including Grof.
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Epstein agreed to plead guilty in two thousand and eight
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to two low level state charges, which included the charge
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of solicitation of miners to engage in prostitution. And she
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still kept working for him after all that, So please
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spare me to the nonsense. It's one thing to try
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and tell us that you had no idea who he
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was or what he was, and then it's the whole
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last other thing to keep working for him when that
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mask has already been ripped off. And I think that's
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the biggest problem for people like Grof, Kellen Vickers and
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Adriana Ross. I mean, it's a big deal. When I
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asked Groff's lawyer Michael Backner, about her knowledge of the
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two thousand and eight conviction, He replied, after Epstein's arrest
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in two thousand and eight, he continuously lied to Leslie
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and other members of the staff, insisting that he had
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been blackmailed and set up. He angrily said that the
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allegations against him were simply false and he had no
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idea that the prostitute he had contact with was a minor.
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In Leslie's mind, that was the reason that he was
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treated so leniently by law enforcement before and after he
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was sentenced. Oh well that is pretty convenient, huh. And
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have you noticed everybody's just blaming Epstein now that he's dead.
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They have no problem pointing the finger at Epstein when
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he was alive, though nobody said shit, nobody had the
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courage to come forward then. But now, well, I don't
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want to get in trouble, So it was him, not me.
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And it's the same kind of defense that Sarah kellen
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Vickers is trying to use. Over the subsequent years, Groff
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has continued to work for Epstein. She was made aware
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of the controversy around the Plea deal's terms on March
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twenty fifth, twenty eleven, her husband Ike emailed her a
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link to a story in The Daily Beast Jeffrey Epstein
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how the hedge fund mogul pedophile got off easy. Graff replied, Yeah,
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he told me yesterday this would be in the Daily Beast.
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And one thing I'll say about the Deli Beast is
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that they continuously reported on Epstein even before it was
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popular to do so. So certainly a tip of the
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cap to them for that. Now, does that mean everything
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they do I agree with, of course not. But when
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it comes to their Epstein reporting, especially Kate Bricklett, they
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did a really good job. And when other outlets were
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running from this story, the Dealy Beast was running stories
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about it, and they were also calling out Epstein at
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the time, which a lot of other people weren't willing
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to do. Then, in twenty seventeen, a case was brought
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by the author Sarah Ransom, who alleged that she had
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been abused by Epstein and this abuse had been facilitated
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by Maxwell Groff and two other staff members. Later that year,
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Ransom withdrew the case against Groff and the other staff
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and reached the settlement with Epstein and Maxwell. The following year,
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and that's how it always worked out, always the settlement,
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never discovery, and never any real evidence being produced. And
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that was all by design, all of that, and that's
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why when Maxwell ended up going to discovery with Virginia,
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I was blown away. I was honestly shocked that it
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progressed that far. But I think at the time Maxwell
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was between a rock and a hard place. She had
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said for so long that Virginia was a liar she
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had to put up. But her lawsuit with Virginia led
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directly to Maxwell being convicted, and it also opened the
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door for everything we're seeing now. Groff continued to work
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for Epstein until his arrest in twenty nineteen. In his will,
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written two days before his death on August tenth, nineteen,
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he put his estate into a trust to be distributed
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among various friends and relations, with most fifty million dollars
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going to his last partner, Karnashuliac. Smaller sums were assigned
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to Maxwell ten million, his brother, his pilot, and various
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other staff members. Groff was listed in a clause under
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the subheading after my death, I forgive any loans which
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I made to the following individuals or entities, Leslie Katherine Groff.
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After Epstein's death, Groff was named in several lawsuits, including
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those brought by anonymous victims in twenty nineteen and twenty
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twenty one, that were later dismissed. As a condition for
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receiving money from the Epstein Victims Compensation Program, survivors were
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barred from pursuing any legal action against Epstein's estate or
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former employees. By the time it closed in twenty twenty one,
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the program had awarded one hundred and twenty one million
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to one hundred and thirty five survivors. Now, think about that,
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not even a million each. Now, of course some people
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got more and some people got less. But Jeffrey Epstein's
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fortune was what, five hundred and forty something million, and
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you're only doling out a fifth of that to the
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people who were harmed the most. I thought it was
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disgusting then, and I still think so now. And I
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got to tell you, I would have never accepted that
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offer ever. If I was somebody who was abused, No
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fucking way I would have went to the mattresses, especially
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after finding out that the Virgin Islands, the US Virgin Islands,
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got more money than all the girls together combined. Imagine
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that shit. They were allegedly culpable for helping Epstein. So
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they ate at one end of the table, and then
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after dinner was done, they went and ate at the other.
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But these survivors have been maligned and said they're just
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chasing a payday. Not really the kind of payday that
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people are thinking here. Grop's name also appeared in FBI
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interviews conducted in twenty nineteen and twenty twenty one. In
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the twenty twenty one interview, the victim, who was under
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eighteen at the time, described how Groff arranged her appointments
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with Epstein, which were massages that turned sexual right away.
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She thought it was pretty obvious leslie knew what was
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going on, though she never said anything to Groff about
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the massages. And look, I've heard that from several different people,
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but it's very hard to prove. And unless you're charging
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Rico here, then I don't think you have enough to
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go on, certainly not enough to get a conviction. She
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would tell Groff if a friend couldn't make it and
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suggest other girls. Groff, she said, also arrange payment from
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Epstein to cover an abortion and payments to cover accommodation
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when she was staying at hotels. She said that Groff
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told her that she couldn't get an apartment as she
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was not yet eighteen, so Groff knew she was underage,
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sending her to go get abortions. All kinds of shit. Really,
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and you have no idea, you have no culpability. Sorry,
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I don't buy it. The most prominent of the cases
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naming Groff was a civil suit brought by Jennifer ARREOs
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against Epstein's escape after his death. Aarreo said that she
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had been abused and raped by Epstein in his own
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when she was fourteen and fifteen years old. In her complaint,
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Arreo's attorney, Daniel Kaiser, claimed that miss Groff directly facilitated,
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as well as conspired with Epstein and other co conspirators
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to make possible and otherwise facilitate, the sexual offenses committed
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against minor plaintiff, Miss ARREOs. And that's the rico, right.
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You have all these people working in coordination to commit crimes,
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and those crimes are benefiting Jeffrey Epstein directly, and from
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there it all rains down on everybody else. This is
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not that difficult, but the whole entire point was never
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to charge this as a criminal enterprise. They always wanted
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to piece it off. They wanted to go after Epstein
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as a singular do that way they can have a
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nice storyline for us about how he was just a
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sick guy with proclivities and all the other stuff was
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just a bunch of bs. In response, Groff's lawyers, John
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Whitcomb and Michael Backner argued that Areos had confused Groff
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with someone else. The alleged crimes had been committed at
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Epstein's house at a time when Grof wasn't based there.
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Groff's job, they said, did not include arranging sexual liaisons
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with underage girls. In fact, they argued, Groff was an
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innocent party who had been wrongfully maligned for years based
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upon sheer, speculation, conjecture, and innuendo. If she were for
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Jeffrey Epstein, she ipso fact though, must have known he
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was abusing teenage girls and must have participated Therein they
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emphasized one key point, she didn't know. Well, look, I'm
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not saying she abused anybody physically. I've never seen that evidence.
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I'm saying she's part of the problem, part of the machine,
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part of the RICO organization that Epstein was running. On
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December one, twenty twenty, the case was dismissed. Areos had
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withdrawn because of the condition set by the compensation program,
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declared her lawyer. We're not surprised that the civil case
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has been dropped since Leslie found out about these inexplicable
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crimes when the rest of the world did, said Bagner
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at the time. As a wife and a mother, Leslie
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remains heartbroken for Jennifer and all the victims, added Whitcomb.
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So heartbroken, she never came forward, so heartbroken. She never
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rat it on Jeffrey Epstein. But don't worry everybody, Leslie Groff,
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she was heartbroken. When I asked Backner about the allegations
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in all the civil suits naming Groff, he said that
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they were simply wrong, confused, and devoid of any facts
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establishing that she had any idea of Epstein's horrible and
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nefarious conduct. In fact, in some instances, the conclusiony conduct
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alleged against her occurred years before Leslie was even employed
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by mister Epstein. That every civil case against Leslie was
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dismissed and she never paid a cent towards the settlement. Cool,
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So she'll have no problem removing herself from the NPA right,
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go to the lawyers, go to the court and say, look,
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I don't need that protection of the NPA. Drop it.
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I want to tell my story. Doubt she's going to
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do that. Although all the civil cases were dropped, Groff
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was still under criminal investigation. But in December of twenty
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twenty one, whit Common Backner stated that after a two
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year investigation, federal prosecutors had decided not to bring any
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charges against her because Epstein was dead. They couldn't go
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any further. What are they going to do If you
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don't have Epstein, you don't have anything. In her lawyer's depiction,
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Groff did nothing, saw nothing, and knew nothing. Her ignorance
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was so total that it seemed to take on solid
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form in closing her like a reinforced ill chamber built
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to withstand attack. Yeah, that sounds about right. Simplicity is
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elusive and slippery, not easily witnessed or proved. The accomplice
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is not the leading actor, but a figure in the shadows.
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In his book Implicit, the Berkeley professor of law Christopher
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Cutz describes how an individual can only be charged with
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a crime of complicity, co conspiracy or aiding and a
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betting say if their actions independently meet criteria of criminality.
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Prosecutors have decided that Groff's actions were not crimes in
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themselves because they didn't charge Rico. How do you miss that?
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Did mister Cuts not talk about that in his book?
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If Groff's simplicity is no longer a criminal matter, it
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remains an ethical one. Groff and the team of pilots, drivers, lawyers,
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and accountants allowed Epstein machine to run with frictionless continuity.
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Every individual involved in his life, however small, their tasks,
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contributed to its operation and its effects. The concept of
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individual more all, accountability is too limited, rights Cuts when
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so many serious harms are brought about by multiple people
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working together, But that doesn't absolve the individual. Something being
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a collective responsibility does not entail that it's not an
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individual responsibility. Well, no, they all had their role to play.
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They all played their roles, they did it well, and
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they all did it in furtherance of the criminal enterprise.
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And if that's not Rico, I have no idea. What
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is Graff then, was one of many enablers of Epstein
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enabling abuse is not a crime, but Amos Gooria, a
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law professor at the University of Utah, is now lobbying
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multiple countries to make it one. Gloria is the son
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of Holocaust survivors. His first book was about the concept
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of the bystander, the person who watches a crime take
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place in front of them and does nothing, such as
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those who taunted his father with water while he was
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on a death march in the former Yugoslavia. We already
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have these laws. I don't know what this author is
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talking about, Rico, that's what it was created for. Look
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up the statutes police. In his second book, Armies of Enablers,
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he wrote about how those enabled the sexual abuse perpetrated by,
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among others, the United States national team gymnastics coach Larry
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Nasser at Michigan State University, and Catholic priests in Boston.
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In every case, there were people who allowed the abuse
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to continue, either by protecting the abuser, the institution, or
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ignoring victim's reports. They knew what was happening, even if
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they never witnessed it taking place and did nothing. For
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Goerra Groff is a classic case. If she was making
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appointments and booking flights. She was enabling all this shit
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can't happen without her. In that sense, she was very
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like the leaders in Catholic Church or the university administrators
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who put their loyalty to their institutions over the duty
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to a victim. This is all incorrect. Those were institutions right.
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Epstein was running a criminal enterprise. It wasn't the Catholic Church.
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Everything that was happening was benefiting Epstein directly, and all
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these lieutenants and all these people play their part to
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make that happen. No different from the mafia. The only
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difference was that in Groff's case, said Gioria, her institution
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was Jeffrey Epstein. When asked what Groff knew of Epstein's crimes,
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Backner said, it's our strong position that Epstein purposely kept
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Leslie isolated from his criminal conduct, since he had no
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reason to confide in her and every reason to lie.
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Epstein lived in two worlds, one legitimate and the other not,
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and made sure they did not collide. Leslie now realizes
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that Epstein made her a face of his legitimate world.
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It's no wonder she was included on so many emails. Yo.
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These people are seriously demented. Leslie Groff is no victim here.
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I'm sorry she is not. For some of Epstein's victims,
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Groff's behavior speaks for itself. She was the person who
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arranged their appointments, booked their flights, and paid their money.
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They were all deeply involved. Rinad O told me they
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can't deny they were enabling. Juliette Bryant wondered if Groff
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and her colleagues convince themselves that the girls were models
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visiting from overseas rather than entertain the idea that Epstein
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had constructed a system of international sex trafficking more likely.
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She thought Groff knew something was going on, but chose
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not to think about it. A lot of people don't
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ask questions. Does it mean you're not culpable? Is your
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name on it? Did you send the emails? Did you
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set the girls up? Sorry? Culpable? Among Graff's emails are
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hundreds between her and Dike, which reveal a wholesome domestic life,
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far removed from the incessant demands of her work. They
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planned dinners and discuss house renovations, the bank loan, and
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decisions about pain colors and windows styles. They figure out playdates,
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football practice timings, and summer camps for their son, and
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worry about how much time he's spending on social media.
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Groff comes across as a mother devoted to her child
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in the ordinary consuming way, and that makes it work.
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In my opinion. Your kid gets doted on while other
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kids were abused. Way to go mom. She worked from
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home when she could to have more time with them,
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and made sure she was home for the day that
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he started the third grade. In an email to a
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pregnant former colleague, Groff tells her to enjoy every minute
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as it was the best, best, best part of my life.
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Time passed so quickly, and she found herself crying when
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she looked at photos of her son when he was little.
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Having a child was, she wrote, the most amazing thing
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you will ever experience. Hey, Leslie, quick question. Do you
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think that the families, the parents of the survivors felt
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any different? Maybe you should have thought about those kids
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when your boss was doing what your boss was doing.
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After a while, clicking on email after email, I felt
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I was reading things I shouldn't. I found myself in
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the private enclosure of Groff's mind, her family and home.
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The details of a life she kept separate from her job,
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the train she was going to take home, the burger
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she'd make, the voluntary work she wanted her son to
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take part in. And yet reading these intimacies also reveal
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the extent to which someone can divide their life in two.
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It's possible to have everyday concerns, to care deeply for
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the people you love, and to willingly work for a
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terrible man who does terrible things. There was nothing exceptional
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or particular about Groff that made her able to do this.
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Anyone could have had their cv plucked from a pile
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and done exactly as she did. We like to think,
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from the safety of not being in her position, that
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we would have done things differently, but the capacity to
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close our eyes the horror is surely near universal. The
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fuck it is. I've spent every day for the last
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seven years railing about this, and I promise you I'm
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not making money, not like Leslie Groff, So save the
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every woman act for somebody else. That's a bunch of bs.
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And yet there's still the question of why she did
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it for so long. When I put this question a backner,
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he replied. Although Leslie considered resigning Epstein like to manipulate,
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and he persuaded her less stay. She was awestruck by
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the quality of the company that continued to surround Epstein
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after his conviction, including heads of state, philanthropists, scientists, philosophers,
18:12
past and president elected officials, and men of women of
18:15
universal approbation. That's always the excuse. Everybody else was doing it,
18:20
so I might as well too. I don't buy that either,
18:24
garbage save it. Regrettably, Leslie, like so many others, was
18:28
misled by Epstein and those complicit with him. Later in
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the statement, Bagner added, Leslie wishes she had never met
18:35
Epstein and that she had resigned instead. Her life has
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been turned upside down, including being viciously threatened simply for
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doing her job as a secretary for a conman who
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intentionally misled her and kept her isolated from his criminal conduct. Listen,
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nobody should be threatening Leslie Groff or anybody else. The
18:53
idea is to force the government into action. That's the idea.
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Whatever Groff knew, it seems she seriously questioned what Epstein
19:03
was doing or her part in it. Perhaps, as Groff
19:07
performed her role as social prestices, she felt her actions
19:11
no longer belonged to her, but were simply an execution
19:14
of his will. It didn't matter what she thought about
19:17
what she did, because it was not her job to think,
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only to enact as desires. This is not to excuse
19:23
what she did or didn't do, but an attempt to
19:26
understand how someone can split themselves between two moral planes.
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To understand how someone who worries about the amount of
19:33
time their child spends on their phone might spend years
19:36
arranging girls to see a man convicted of abusing children,
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And to understand why in all that time she didn't
19:42
walk away. Are you for real? Let me help you out. Money.
19:47
That's why. Money, That's what it all comes down to.
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When Graff goes to Washington on June ninth, she will
19:55
not be the first of Epstein's former employees to appear
19:58
in front of the House Committee. His account Richard Kahn
20:01
and lawyer Darren Endyke were both interviewed in early March.
20:04
Cohn said he made the wrong decision in continuing to
20:07
work for Epstein after two thousand and eight, but there
20:10
was a financial crisis and he had a family to support.
20:13
Money like usual, That's what the lall say. Money, money,
20:16
money money in Dyke said he had no knowledge whatsoever
20:23
of Jeffrey Epstein's wrongdoings while he was working for him.
20:26
Khan also spoke of the toll it had taken on
20:28
his family, said his reputation had been dragged through the mud,
20:32
a situation that did not seem to elicit great sympathy.
20:36
A Democratic representative, James Walkinshaw hughes Khan of being wilfully ignorant. Well,
20:42
that's being nice, that's being nice. I'm sorry you can't
20:46
be as close to Epstein as Indike and con were
20:49
and not know. I'm climbing all the way to the
20:52
top of Mount Everest and screaming bullshit for that one.
20:55
The interviews offered no great revelation or a catharsis, but
20:58
they did paint a picture of the awe suspended existence
21:01
of all those closely connected to Epstein who have evaded
21:04
formal accountability. They might never be found guilty of a crime,
21:09
but they can't escape the shadow of association with the man.
21:12
They live instead in the purgatory of undefined suspicion, where
21:17
the best that can be hoped for is the impossible,
21:20
a life out of sight, their name forgotten, the past rewritten,
21:24
or maybe just come forward and tell everybody what you'd know.
21:29
It's wild that they think anyone's going to feel sorry
21:31
for these people. During her last weeks of working for Epstein,
21:37
Groff handled the usual range of tasks. Flights were booked
21:40
four redacted from San Francisco to Hong Kong, or propane
21:44
delivery at Epstein's island needed chasing. There was a back
21:47
and forth on who was keeping a copy of some boatlogs.
21:50
Groff wasn't sure of the necessity of this, but the
21:53
fact Jeffrey asked about it means something. On July fifth,
21:56
twenty nineteen, Groff emailed Epstein and various colleagues about a
22:01
man called Pokey who was supposed to have arrived on
22:04
the island. He said he could be there seven am
22:07
last we heard. She wrote, can you confirm? Epstein? Meanwhile,
22:11
email Groff and others complaining about malfunctioning windows which were
22:15
meant to swovel past each other, so the entire window
22:18
is open. The next day, Epstein would fly on his
22:21
private jet from Paris to Teterborough, New Jersey, where he
22:24
was arrested on charges of sex trafficking miners. There was
22:28
no sign in the emails. As Groff worried about Pokey's
22:31
no show that our boss, entire criminal edifice was on
22:34
the verge of collapse. It was just another day with
22:38
a mixture of administrative demands and the endless effort to
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make one man's life unfold minute to minute exactly as
22:45
he wished. Another employee replied to say that Pokey wasn't
22:49
answering his phone. Groff, not one to back down from
22:52
pressing tasks in front of a Roboss, issued an instruction
22:56
keep trying. So look, folks, I get it. Leslie Groff
23:00
certainly wasn't abusing anybody, and I've never thought that, but
23:04
if you look at it through the lens of Rico,
23:07
there is no doubt that she was complicit. But unfortunately
23:10
this is not a Rico case, and considering that, I
23:13
don't see how they could charge Leslie Groff with anything really.
23:16
So it's going to be interesting to see what she
23:18
has to say when she appears before Congress. But I
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just don't know how far they're going to be able
23:23
to get when it comes to trying to get to
23:25
the bottom of what was going on. So it's going
23:28
to be interesting to see what she has to say
23:30
when she makes her appearance before Congress, and like usual,
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we'll be right here every step of the way. All
23:37
the information that goes with this episode can be found
23:40
in the description box