The Sealed Files – Manhattan Judge Refuses to Release Epstein Grand Jury Transcripts

A federal judge in Manhattan on Wednesday denied the government’s request to release the transcripts of a grand jury from the prosecution of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein – and in doing so issued a decision that goes far beyond legal technicalities. Amid growing conspiracy theories and disappointed expectations of President Trump, the Epstein case remains an abyss of unresolved questions, half-truths and political explosives. Epstein, who moved for decades in the most exclusive circles of American society, was indicted in 2019 on charges of sex trafficking of minors. But in his 14-page opinion, Judge Richard M. Berman now made it clear: the only person who testified before the grand jury at the time was a single FBI agent. Nothing more. The judge emphasized that the material was insignificant compared to what the Justice Department already held in its files. He wrote verbatim that the transcripts “pale in comparison to the investigation information and materials in the hands of the Department of Justice.” The decision came just one week after another federal judge in Manhattan had rejected the government’s request to unseal the grand jury transcripts from the case against Ghislaine Maxwell. Maxwell, Epstein’s longtime confidante and accomplice, is serving a twenty-year prison sentence for abusing and exploiting young girls together with him. Here too, the judiciary followed the line that the secrecy of the grand jury is a protective mechanism that may only be breached in exceptional cases – and such circumstances, Berman said, were not present.

The political dimension of this decision is obvious. After his return to the White House, Trump himself had announced that he would bring light into the Epstein case – a gesture to his own supporters, among whom conspiracy theories about Epstein’s death have spread like wildfire. In the six years since that August morning when Epstein was found dead in his cell at the Metropolitan Detention Center, hardly any name has been so closely associated with rumors, suspicions and insinuations. Officially, his death was ruled a suicide, but the fact that he died in federal custody while awaiting trial has fueled countless speculations – from gross negligence to targeted assassination. Epstein’s closeness to powerful politicians, businessmen and intellectuals provided the breeding ground for fantasies about a “secret elite” allegedly controlling the United States. Especially in right-wing circles this narrative became a core ideological element. It was no coincidence that close associates of Trump, even before their time in government, had aggressively promoted such theories. But the president, who once promised to bring the truth to light, now stands empty-handed. The judges are blocking the publication of the grand jury transcripts, and the Justice Department has so far provided no new findings.

This vacuum is becoming dangerous for Trump. While he tries to shake off the pressure and assure his supporters that he will provide transparency, it is precisely the inaction in the Epstein matter that threatens to become a fault line – between the president and those parts of his base who revere him as a fighter against the “dark forces” in the state. The disappointed expectation could turn into political poison. Thus, after Berman’s ruling, what has characterized the Epstein case for years remains once again: a vacuum filled with mistrust, speculation and questions to which no one wants to give a clear answer. And the longer this silence continues, the louder the voices become that claim there is a truth at the heart of American democracy that must be withheld from the public at all costs. Legally, Berman’s decision is understandable. The rules of the grand jury serve to protect witnesses, the integrity of the proceedings and the presumption of innocence. Without compelling “special circumstances,” as the judge put it, this wall of confidentiality may not be broken. But politically, this very legal logic is a powder keg. In a climate in which facts have long since been replaced by mistrust, every sealed document seems like proof of a cover-up. The more firmly the judiciary clings to its rules, the more space it opens for those who claim there is a truth behind closed doors. And thus the Epstein case becomes a portent for the United States: a rule of law that remains true to itself – and a society that therefore believes in it less and less.

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