AP Sources: Epstein Jail Guards Had Been Offered Plea Deal

Federal prosecutors offered a plea deal to two correctional officers responsible for guarding Jeffrey Epstein on the night of his death, but the officers have declined the offer, people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.The existence of the plea offer signals the Justice Department is considering criminal charges in connection with the wealthy financier’s death at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York in August. The city’s medical examiner ruled Epstein’s death a suicide.

The guards on Epstein’s unit are suspected of failing to check on him every half hour, as required, and of fabricating log entries to show they had. As part of the proposed plea deal, prosecutors wanted the guards to admit they falsified the prison records, according to the people familiar with the matter. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to publicly discuss the investigation.

US Deportations to El Salvador Double as Bukele, Trump Continue to Clean up Crime in Both Countries

Interrogation video shows trans killer’s calm confession to ambushing parents over gender transition battle

Alarming Change in Middle East Geography Is Setting Stage for the Bible’s Armageddon Prophecy

Bishop Barron contemplates ‘paradox’ of ‘free exercise of religion’ in US ahead of Rededicate 250

Trump, Netanyahu to speak Sunday amid reports of potential revival of military action on Iran

Teen vanished from home decades ago – now feds hope new image and shifting loyalties reveal truth

2026 Oregon primary features a candidate who is a pencil

Trump calls out Rep Thomas Massie: ‘Kentucky, get this LOSER out of politics’ Tuesday

Survivors of Plane Crash Off Florida Were Stranded on a Life Raft With No Idea If Help Was Coming

Dem Infighting Worsens as Fingers Start Pointing in Heated California Governor’s Race

Trump threatens to pull Boebert endorsement, calls congresswoman ‘weak minded’ over Massie support

Trump celebrates after UN climate committee moves away from its most extreme global warming scenario

Trump scores major Republican primary victory as Cassidy ousted in Louisiana

Maduro’s alleged ‘bag man’ Alex Saab arrested less than 3 years after Biden pardon: report

The U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan had no comment on the plea offer. Both guards were working overtime because of staffing shortages. They have been placed on administrative leave while the FBI and the Justice Department’s inspector general investigate the circumstances surrounding Epstein’s death. The 66-year-old had been awaiting trial on charges of sexually abusing teenage girls. Epstein was placed on suicide watch after he was found on his cell floor July 23 with bruises on his neck. Multiple people familiar with operations at the jail have said Epstein was then taken off suicide watch about a week before his death, meaning he was less closely monitored but still supposed to be checked on every 30 minutes.

Epstein’s death exposed mounting evidence that the chronically understaffed Metropolitan Correctional Center may have bungled its responsibility to keep him alive. Guards often work overtime day after day, and other employees are pressed into service as correctional officers. Falsification of records has been a problem throughout the federal prison system. Kathleen Hawk Sawyer, who was named director of the Bureau of Prisons after Epstein’s death, disclosed in a Nov. 4 internal memo that a review of operations across the agency found some staff members failed to perform required rounds and inmate counts but logged that they had done so anyway. “Falsification of information in government systems and documents is also a violation of policy, and may be subject to criminal prosecution as well,” Hawk Sawyer wrote in the memo to top prison officials, a copy of which was obtained by the AP.