Latest / The Epstein Chronicles / Ron Wyden’s Report on Wall Street and Jeffrey Epstein (Part 2) (8/16/26)

Transcript

Ron Wyden’s Report on Wall Street and Jeffrey Epstein (Part 2) (8/16/26) · The Epstein Chronicles

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  Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're diving right back in
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  Speaker 1: to the financial report on Jeffrey Epstein prepared by Senator
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  Speaker 1: widen and the Senate. Following the review of the Epstein Stars,
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  Speaker 1: Senator Widen's staff began reviewing bank records that were unsealed
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  Speaker 1: during lawsuits against the banks file by Epstein victims, USVII
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  Speaker 1: and news organizations. After the passage of the Epstein File
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  Speaker 1: Transparency Act. Senator widenstaff also reviewed documents unsealed by the
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  Speaker 1: US Department of Justice that revealed information about Epstein's financial
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  Speaker 1: activities and those of his wealthy benefactors. These records included
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  Speaker 1: internal correspondence between bank employees Stars related to Ebstein's accounts,
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  Speaker 1: due diligence, documents, estate planning structures, and other business records.
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  Speaker 1: Taken together, they revealed the inner workings of how Wall
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  Speaker 1: Street Banks made decisions related to Ebstein's accounts. The records
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  Speaker 1: reviewed by Senator Widen staff demonstrated that top executives a
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  Speaker 1: major Wall Street banks were aware of Epstein's suspicious financial
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  Speaker 1: activity for years, but withheld information from the US government
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  Speaker 1: protecting Epstein from federal scrutiny. The document suggests there was
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  Speaker 1: at least two reasons for the Wall Street banks to
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  Speaker 1: protect Epstein. One his money. Epstein was an ultra wealthy
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  Speaker 1: individual who was among jpmc's largest private banking clients. He
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  Speaker 1: generated millions in fees for JPMC every year. Epstein was
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  Speaker 1: part of an elite group known within JPMC as the
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  Speaker 1: Wall of Cash. Two, his friend's money. Bankers sought to
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  Speaker 1: continue working with Epstein even after he was terminated as
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  Speaker 1: a JPMC client because they believed he had influence over
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  Speaker 1: a cadre of wealthy individuals like billionairely On Black. This
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  Speaker 1: report outlines the findings of the investigation conducted by Senator
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  Speaker 1: widen Staff and proposes reforms to federal anti money laundering
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  Speaker 1: laws to deter banks from looking to the other way
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  Speaker 1: with regard to suspicious activity involving ultra wealthy clients. The
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  Speaker 1: report also calls on federal bank regulators and the DOJ
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  Speaker 1: to promptly take action to hold banks and their employees
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  Speaker 1: responsible for significant compliance failures that enabled epstein sex trafficking
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  Speaker 1: activity for nearly two decades. Three. Federal law requires timely
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  Speaker 1: reporting of suspicious financial transactions. Under the Bank Secrecy Act BSA,
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  Speaker 1: financial institutions are required to maintain anti money laundering programs
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  Speaker 1: that conduct ongoing due diligence of its customers and promptly
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  Speaker 1: report suspicious transactions by filing stars with the US Treasury Department.
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  Speaker 1: Banks are legally required to monitor customer activity and flag
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  Speaker 1: suspicious transactions contemporaneously in order to prevent the US banking
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  Speaker 1: system from being used to facilitate criminal activity, including human trafficking.
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  Speaker 1: Legally mandated AML programs must utilize compliance departments, train and
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  Speaker 1: escalate potentially suspicious transactions, transaction monitoring software, and robust know
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  Speaker 1: your customer and customer due diligence efforts to identify patterns
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  Speaker 1: indicative of potential illicit activity, such as large movements of cache,
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  Speaker 1: unusual wire transfers, or payments that lack a clearer business purpose.
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  Speaker 1: Under the BSA, banks are required to file stars when
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  Speaker 1: they detect a known or suspected violation of federal law
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  Speaker 1: or a suspicious transaction related to a money laundering activity
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  Speaker 1: or a violation of the Bank Secrecy Act. Specifically, a
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  Speaker 1: bank must file a SAR if it knows suspects or
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  Speaker 1: has reason to suspect that a transaction has no business
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  Speaker 1: or a parent lawful purpose, or is not the sort
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  Speaker 1: in which a particular customer would normally be expected to engage,
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  Speaker 1: and the institution knows of no reasonable explanation for the
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  Speaker 1: transaction after examining the available facts, including the background and
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  Speaker 1: possible purpose of the transaction. The BSA also requires financial
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  Speaker 1: inns institutions to file stars in a timely manner. A
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  Speaker 1: bank must file a SAR within thirty days after the
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  Speaker 1: date of initial detection of facts that may constitute a
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  Speaker 1: basis for filing a suspicious activity report. According to Treasury
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  Speaker 1: Department Financial Crimes Enforcement Network FINZEN, in no case shall
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  Speaker 1: reporting be delayed more than sixty calendar days after the
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  Speaker 1: date of initial detection of a reportable transaction. Additionally, the
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  Speaker 1: BSA's Customer Due Diligence Rule requires financial institutions to maintain
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  Speaker 1: policies and procedures in place to understand the nature and
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  Speaker 1: purpose of customer relationships and conduct ongoing monitoring to identify
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  Speaker 1: and report suspicious transactions. A key purpose of AML laws
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  Speaker 1: and regulation is for banks to give law enforcement real
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  Speaker 1: time information to enable it to detect violations of law
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  Speaker 1: and protect public safety. This is especially true when suspicious
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  Speaker 1: financial activity involves human trafficking, danger is narcotics like fentanyl,
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  Speaker 1: organized crime, and the financing of terrorism. Failing to file
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  Speaker 1: a timely SAR is both illegal and dangerous. It can
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  Speaker 1: deprive federal law enforcement of the information needed to stop
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  Speaker 1: dangerous criminals. Because JPMC terminated Jeffrey Epstein as a client
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  Speaker 1: in twenty thirteen but waited until twenty nineteen to file
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  Speaker 1: thousands of STARS on his transactions, no one could credibly
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  Speaker 1: claim that stars were filed within thirty days of detecting
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  Speaker 1: suspicious activity. Senator Widen's investigators thus believe that JPMC failed
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  Speaker 1: to comply with the Bank Secrecy Act for the entire
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  Speaker 1: duration of its relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Part four. Bank
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  Speaker 1: of America failed to properly screen and report Leon Black's
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  Speaker 1: payments to Epstein. Between twenty twelve and twenty seventeen, billionaire
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  Speaker 1: financier Leon Black paid Epstein one hundred and seventy million
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  Speaker 1: for purported tax advice and estate planning services, according to
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  Speaker 1: a settlement agreement signed by Black in USVII. Epstein then
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  Speaker 1: used the money and paid him to fund his sex
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  Speaker 1: trafficking activity in USVII. As part of the investigation, Finance
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  Speaker 1: Committee investigators reviewed sars filed with the US Treasury Department
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  Speaker 1: in twenty twenty by Bank of America regardingly on Black's accounts.
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  Speaker 1: The sars were filed by Bank of America on February seventh,
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty, nearly eight months after Epstein was arrested and
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  Speaker 1: many years after Black's cash had been deposited in Epstein's accounts,
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  Speaker 1: raising questions about Bank of America's handling of large wire
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  Speaker 1: transfers from Black to Epstein. The SARS suggests that Bank
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  Speaker 1: of America waved through the one hundred and seventy million
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  Speaker 1: Black wired Epstein without conducting any meaningful due diligence or
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  Speaker 1: probing the purpose of the payments. The sars also showed
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  Speaker 1: that Bank of America waited five to seven years before
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  Speaker 1: flagging the payments to the Treasury Department. In doing so,
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  Speaker 1: Bank of America may have violated federal laws requiring Finns
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  Speaker 1: financial institutions to conduct due diligence on their customers and
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  Speaker 1: report suspicious financial activity to the US government in a
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  Speaker 1: timely manner. According to the Treasury Department, records. Leon Black,
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  Speaker 1: as well as related individuals and entities, maintained accounts at
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  Speaker 1: Bank of America that were used to pay Epstein approximately
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  Speaker 1: one hundred and seventy million over a five year period.
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  Speaker 1: The payments to a Epstein came from a series of
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  Speaker 1: accounts at Bank of America controlled by Black. The Black
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  Speaker 1: accounts and were made to two entities controlled by Epstein,
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  Speaker 1: Southern Trust Company Incorporated Southern Trust accounts at Deutsche Bank
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  Speaker 1: and the Financial Trust Company accounts at JPMC. The payments
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  Speaker 1: were made through eighteen large wire transfers from the Black
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  Speaker 1: account to Epstein's accounts. The wires were generally between eight
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  Speaker 1: to ten million, but in some cases were substantially larger,
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  Speaker 1: including one payment of twenty million in July of twenty fourteen.
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  Speaker 1: Most transactions occurred between twenty thirteen in twenty fifteen, when
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  Speaker 1: one hundred and forty million was transferred from Black's accounts
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  Speaker 1: to Epstein's Southern Trust Company accounts at Deutsche Bank. Despite
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  Speaker 1: the unusually large size of the payments and Epstein's lack
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  Speaker 1: of credentials and licenses related to tax and estate planning services,
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  Speaker 1: the Treasury Department record suggests that Bank of America did
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  Speaker 1: not conduct significant due diligence on the payments and did
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  Speaker 1: not report the transactions to the Treasury Department until February
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  Speaker 1: twenty twenty, eight months after Epstein was arrested and seven
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  Speaker 1: years after the payments began. A the wire transfer activity
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  Speaker 1: does not have a verifiable business purpose. In Bank of
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  Speaker 1: America's February seventh, twenty twenty SARI filing, the bank flagged
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  Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty six million paid by the Black
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  Speaker 1: accounts to Epstein and stated that the wire transfer activity
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  Speaker 1: does not have a verifiable business purpose. The bank's twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty filing also stated that year's old transactions had no parent, economic, business,
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  Speaker 1: or lawful purpose. Bank of America also filed the second
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  Speaker 1: STAR eight months later, in October of twenty twenty, flag
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  Speaker 1: in two potentially unusual wires from the black accounts to
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  Speaker 1: Epstein that the bank had failed to identify, one for
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  Speaker 1: five and a half million in November of twenty twelve
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  Speaker 1: and another for eight million in twenty seventeen. This is
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  Speaker 1: evidence of a significant compliance failure by Bank of America.
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  Speaker 1: It's alarming that a major bank waved through one hundred
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  Speaker 1: and seventy million in wire transfers from a billionaire to
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  Speaker 1: a registered sex offender, only to conclude they had no
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  Speaker 1: verifiable business purpose years later. It's also emblematic of a
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  Speaker 1: larger pattern across Wall Street, where financial institutions do not
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  Speaker 1: sufficiently scrutinize ultra wealthy clients like Leon Black, for fear
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  Speaker 1: that the clients who don't want to answer questions will
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  Speaker 1: simply take their business elsewhere. Investigators into the crimes of
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  Speaker 1: Epstein have thus uncovered an important find that extends beyond
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  Speaker 1: Epstein himself. Wall Street banks have been willing to turn
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  Speaker 1: a blind eye to the suspicious transactions of ultra wealthy clients,
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  Speaker 1: even if the failure to scrutinize and report these transactions
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  Speaker 1: runs directly a foul of federal law. If federal prosecutors
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  Speaker 1: are serious about preventing the next Jeffrey Epstein, they must
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  Speaker 1: hold Wall Street accountable. It does not appear that Bank
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  Speaker 1: of America ever asked Black or Epstein for additional information
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  Speaker 1: or business records to substantiate the purported tax and estate
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  Speaker 1: planning services Epstein claimed he was performing for one hundred
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  Speaker 1: and seventy million dollars. Epstein was not a credential tax advisor,
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  Speaker 1: and that Bank of America conducted thorough due diligence. It's
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  Speaker 1: likely would have resulted in a timelier determination that the
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  Speaker 1: wire activity did not have verifiable, economic, business, or lawful purposes.
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  Speaker 1: Black's account that Bank of America were supervised by Jane Heller.
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  Speaker 1: DOJ records identify Jane Heller as one of mister Black's
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  Speaker 1: principal anchors at Bank of America during the period in
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  Speaker 1: which the payments to Epstein occurred. One twenty fourteen email
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  Speaker 1: by employees at Leon Black's family office indicate that Jane
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  Speaker 1: Heller is calling every day for this statement, making clear
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  Speaker 1: she was running point on coverage of Black's accounts. Another
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  Speaker 1: internal Bank of America document noted that BofA. Jane Heller
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  Speaker 1: already has a relationship with Black that includes a four
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  Speaker 1: hundred million dollar art secured line. All right, folks, we're
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  Speaker 1: going to wrap up right here and in the next
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  Speaker 1: episode dealing with the topic, We're going to pick up
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  Speaker 1: where we left off. All the information that goes with
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  Speaker 1: this episode can be found in the description box.