Jennifer Anton  | 00:05

Hi everyone, this is Jennifer Anton and today we’re going to be talking about the Jeffrey Epstein cases, specifically who else that was involved with Epstein may have committed crimes with underage girls and what evidence is there for that?

There’s been a lot of discussion about whether people are covering up crimes by rich and powerful men. And we’re going to talk about that today. With an attorney from the Dallas area, John Helms. John is Dallas-based. He’s a criminal defense attorney who’s been practicing law for more than 30 years. He’s a former federal prosecutor for the Northern District of Texas, and he never lost a trial or an appeal as an assistant United States attorney. Welcome, John.

John Helms | 00:49

Thank you. Glad to be here.

Jennifer Anton | 00:53

Thank you. So the question I want to talk to you about today, the overall question, is who else was involved with Epstein that may have committed crimes with underage girls and what evidence is there for that? What can you tell us about that?

John Helms | 01:08

That is, That is I think the most important question that people really want to know about, and I think sometimes in all the discussion and all the media coverage, we sort of lose sight of what the real question is, and that is, What other men, if any, were involved And molesting underage girls. With or in conjunction with Jeffrey Epstein. And so the answer is, the global answer is, We don’t know. 

There are some people who have been identified by victims of Jeffrey Epstein, as having been potentially involved with them. There’s a handful of people. There’s a lot of discussion about who is named. A keyword is named in different files or memos or things like that. What you have to keep in mind is that the fact that someone’s name is mentioned in an investigative file doesn’t mean at all that they may have done anything wrong. They may have been witnesses to something. They may have just had something incidental to do with things. So you can’t focus on who’s been named. You have to focus on who’s been named. On the question of who may have been involved in molesting underage girls. And so in trying to unpack all the evidence of that, I think it’s important to go back to the beginning, which is the Florida investigations.

Jennifer Anton | 02:52

Yeah, let’s go back to that. So Epstein was prosecuted in Florida. For these kinds of crimes, right? In 2000, the early 2000s? Tell us about.

John Helms | 03:03

That. Yeah, that’s right. In 2005, A 14-year-old girl and her stepmother came forward and went to the Palm Beach Police Department. And they said that she had given Jeffrey Epstein a massage and that he had told her to take off her clothes, and he masturbated, and then he gave her two or three hundred dollars. And that was the first allegation that went to law enforcement about some wrongdoing.

So the Palm Beach Police Department opened an investigation. And they had a grand jury that brought in girls claiming to have been victims of Jeffrey Epstein. And The Palm Beach prosecutors for reasons involving Florida law and their perception about juries. They did not want to bring any charges unless the victim was under 16 and had actually been raped or killed. There was an actual sex act. And the local law enforcement, police chief, and detective were concerned about how this prosecution at the state level was unfolding, and they didn’t have confidence in the way the prosecutors were handling it.

So they brought in the FBI. And they asked the FBI to investigate it. So the FBI has the US Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of Florida open a case on this. At that point, the federal government starts investigating. Well, then Jeffrey Epstein hires a number of very prominent, very high-powered criminal defense lawyers to come in and intervene. And they worked with the local Police Department, they worked with the federal prosecutors and eventually, even though the assistant U.S. attorney who was involved in the case, even though she had recommended a large indictment, I believe that there was, there were questions about whether the case should be or could be prosecuted federally. 

Reason for that is, If all you have is somebody molests a young woman, in Palm Beach, Florida. There is not a federal crime involved in that. There has to be a connection to interstate commerce. And I think the federal prosecutors were worried that they didn’t have enough of a connection to interstate commerce. So what they did is they made a deal with Epstein. Where the federal government would agree not to prosecute him and certain others associated with him for any federal crimes. And he would agree to plead guilty to soliciting an underage prostitute at the state level. And there was an agreed sentence, of 18 months in jail. That he was going to serve. And he would be, He would have to register as a sex offender. And there was going to be a mechanism set up so that victims could be compensated with money from him.

So that was the deal that they made. And so Jeffrey Epstein eventually was sentenced to 18 months in jail. He served 13 months because he got the 18 months reduced for credit for good behavior. And during the 13 months that he did serve, he was allowed to leave the jail for 12 hours a day to go work, and then he had to come back at night. He did register as a sex offender, and the fund for the victims was set up. But there was a lot of outrage on behalf of victims. Who said that they had not been consulted about this deal. And they began pressuring the Justice Department and in fact filed a lawsuit against the Justice Department claiming that they weren’t adequately informed. So that’s where we start off. So the first person came forward in 2005 and the deal for the 18 months at the state level and no federal prosecution, that was in 2008.

Jennifer Anton | 07:48

So. My understanding is that Epstein was then charged again in federal court in New York in 2019. Were those charges different from the Florida charges?

John Helms | 08:02

That’s exactly right. The US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan charged Jeffrey Epstein with two crimes in 2019. They were iIn some ways different. And they were in some ways the same. The allegations, the charges in the New York case in 2019 involved sex trafficking and conspiracy to do sex trafficking. They specifically identified alleged victims who they said had been molested and trafficked. At his New York residents. But they refer to the Palm Beach residents people who were trafficked there. So there was overlap. Some of the alleged victims, some of the victims in the New York case, were involved in Palm Beach County and it was the same time frame. As the prior investigations, 2002 to 2005, which is when the Florida investigation started. 

Another difference is that they charged federal crimes. In the Florida case, because of the deal they made, he was convicted of a state of Florida charge. Of soliciting an underage prostitute. These were federal crimes of sex trafficking of minors in interstate or affecting interstate commerce. So some similarities, some overlap, and some differences.

Jennifer Anton | 09:43

So let’s bring in Ghislane Maxwell into this picture. She was charged in 2020 What happened with her case and what was her involvement?

John Helms | 09:53

Well, she was charged with conspiracy to sex traffic. Underage girls. Her involvement was that she would help identify girls. That she would bring to Jeffrey Epstein that he could give them a job or whatever he was going to do, and then he would eventually be able to molest them and then he would have those girls go out and recruit more girls. So she was someone who was helping him identify girls and then helping him control them once they had been brought into his sphere.

Jennifer Anton | 10:36

So all this resulted in a lot of lawsuits. Lawsuits against Epstein, lawsuits against Maxwell, and others. What happened with the lawsuits and how are those significant today?

John Helms | 10:50

So the lawsuits actually are very important. There were, like you say, there were lawsuits against Epstein and then eventually against his estate where victims are trying to get compensation from him. There were lawsuits against Ghislaine Maxwell. And in particular, there was a victim by the name of Virginia Jafray. Who sued Ghislaine Maxwell. And there is a deposition transcript. Where Virginia to fray. Had her deposition taken by Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyers.

So she answered questions under oath, and there’s a transcript of that. And for our purposes today, What’s important about that is that she identifies several men who she says she was trafficked to. Her words are, “I was trafficked to them.” What she means by that She says. Is that Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell. Or both. Told her to give these men massages. He says, She understood. Massages to be code for these kind of sexual massages that Jeffrey Epstein would get from these underage girls. 

One of the grooming processes that he had was to have them give him a massage, and then later that’s going to evolve into sexual things. So she says she was told by Maxwell or Epstein or both to go give these men massages. Interestingly, she doesn’t say whether she actually did that with. Any or all of these men. And she doesn’t say whether any massages that she might have given resulted in anything improper.

So, but to her, she’s suing Ghislaine Maxwell. And she’s been working with lawyers to try to make her story as threatening as possible so that Ghislaine Maxwell will have to sell and pay her a lot of money. So she uses a charged word like trafficking. And then she identifies people she says she was trafficked to. But the lawyer for Ghislaine Maxwell doesn’t ask her, well, did you end up having any type of sexual relations with the person? Did you even actually give the massage to the person? The people who were identified were some businessmen that probably nobody’s heard of. Wealthy businessmen, but they’re not high profile figures and she identifies Alan Dershowitz, a prominent lawyer, Harvard University law professor. And Prince Andrew.

So, that is a source of information about other people who may or may not have been involved in something improper. There was a lawsuit where she sued Prince Andrew. That lawsuit was settled. And so there wasn’t a resolution of it other than there was a settlement, but there was an accusation that he was involved in illegal activity went with her when she was underage. There was a series of lawsuits. In involving Virginia Jafray and Alan Dershowitz, the law professor. She sued him her defamation because he said that her allegations were false. And so she said, well, you’re calling me a liar. So you’re defaming me. 

He sued her for defamation. Or He said she falsely accused him of having sexual relations with her. Their lawyers ended up suing each other. It was this big mess and that case was settled by some, each side made some statements and the statements are basically designed so that each side can claim victory. 

So Virginia Jafray makes a statement as part of the settlement. That she may have been mistaken when she said that she had sex with Alan Dershowitz. May have been mistaken. Now, she later walks that back. And says, I’m sticking to what I said. He, Alan Dershowitz makes a statement that she may have believed what she said about him. So it’s these statements where each side can say, I want. But nothing’s really resolved.

So, Alan Dershowitz vehemently denies that he did anything improper or wrong with her. So he’s another person who’s been identified by a victim as someone who may have done something improper with an underage girl. The civil lawsuits are a source of information about a lot of the details in the allegations. So the civil lawsuits, because of the nature of civil lawsuits where you’re trying to get money and you can have depositions taken, they give us some insight. Into allegations about other people besides Maxwell and Epstein.

Jennifer Anton | 16:29

So, It sounds like what you’re saying is that litigation, those lawsuits have concluded. But all of this is coming back up today. Why are these cases making headlines today?

John Helms | 16:46

They’re, are a couple of reasons. Back in February of this year, 2025. Fox News did an interview with Attorney General Pam Bondi and in that interview, arguably she says that there is an Epstein client list. 

Now I personally don’t think that’s what she meant. But many people took that interview as the Attorney General saying, I have a copy of a client list of Jeffrey Epstein. The client list, the supposed client list, is something that has been discussed in right-wing media, right-wing online forums for a long time. And it’s a buzzword for a lot of people who think that there is a list of Epstein clients. Out there that’s a list of people who have had sex with underage girls and that it’s being hidden.

So when she said that, interest pops up. And then a few months ago, the Wall Street Journal came out with a story about a abound book. Of birthday letters, written to Jeffrey Epstein. And the Wall Street Journal says, their reporting says, President Trump. Has written a birthday letter. To Jeffrey Epstein. And that was considered a big deal, and then President Trump immediately and forcefully claimed that this was completely false. He had never done any such thing. And his denials I think we’re met with a lot of skepticism. Justifiably. But his denials were so forceful that it almost seems like the coverup is worse than the crime, although writing a birthday letter to someone is not a crime. Not evidence of a crime. But he was so vehement and so angry that this letter was being attributed to him. That he threatened to sue and so it put all this attention on this letter, and then that caused more attention to be put on the whole Epstein issue, and people began publicly, repeatedly calling for more disclosure about the Epstein investigations and the Epstein cases.

Jennifer Anton | 19:25

Okay. So let’s remind our viewers that Jeffrey Epstein is no longer alive. Jeffrey Epstein died in jail pending his trial. Is that correct? And there was a lot of, well, I guess what the public has been told is that he committed suicide. He took his own life. But then I’ve heard that there’s suspicion that maybe someone else took his life. What’s going on there?

John Helms | 19:56

I think this is a classic conspiracy theory. Oftentimes in conspiracy theories, Someone comes up with a possible motive for something to happen, and then therefore they conclude it must have happened. Personally, I think he committed suicide. I say that for several reasons.

First of all, in my own experience. People who are accused of molesting, children, underage people. Sometimes commit suicide. Because there’s so much shame involved. I’ve had that happen. With a client of mine. So I know that facing a very public trial where all this evidence against him is going to come out. Could easily have been so shameful to him that he thought life was not worth living. That’s something that I know from my own experience can happen. So it makes perfect sense to me. That someone facing that would commit suicide.

I also think in order for someone to have been able to kill Jeffrey Epstein in a jail cell, in New York. The number of people who would have known about this, who would have had to have known about it, would be a lot. Because you can’t just sneak a guy into a cell and not have people notice. You can’t just supposedly have people doctoring videotape and nobody knows about it. A lot of people would have had to know about it if it happened. And if a lot of people knew about it, we would have heard people coming out and saying, “I know this happened because I was there and we haven’t seen that.” And I haven’t seen any convincing evidence that anything other than suicide happened. I mean, there are some things that people think, well, maybe this could have happened. Maybe this could have happened. I don’t think so. It makes sense to me that this was a suicide. And I think If it had been something else, we would have heard from people who knew about it, but we haven’t.

Jennifer Anton | 22:09

Well, those are some good points. Yeah. Well, so recently. As this issue has come back up, President Trump recently ordered the Epstein grand jury transcripts to be unsealed. Is there likely to be information in there about people who could have molested the young girls with Epstein?

John Helms | 22:32

I don’t think so. I think that, the grand jury transcripts. Were disclosed. Well, If they are disclosed, there won’t be anything that identifies other people who may have molested underage girls. And I say that because in federal grand jury proceedings, you don’t have to have victims come in and testify. You can have an FBI agent, you can have one FBI agent come in to the grand jury and testify about what their investigation has shown. And it can be in general terms, and all you have to do is convince a grand jury that there’s probable cause to believe a crime was committed. That’s a very low standard. Much lower than beyond a reasonable doubt. Which is what it takes to convict someone of a crime. 

So I doubt that. They did more than have an agent. Come in and testify to the grand jury about what Epstein did to girls. And what, Ghislane Maxwell did to help Epstein, but I don’t think that they needed to or would have focused on who else may have molested girls too.

Jennifer Anton | 23:53

Well, if that’s the case, then where are we going to get information about others who may have molested young girls?

John Helms | 24:01

If there is information about that, and it would be in the investigative files that the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office have from the investigation about the case. When the FBI is investigating a case like this, one of the things they will do is they will go and interview alleged victims.

So in that case, that would be alleged girls, maybe now women. Who were molested by Jeffrey Epstein. And they will then ask them about all of their experiences with Epstein. They will ask them whether Epstein sent them to other people, tried to hook them up with other people they will ask those types of questions. So those memos that the FBI agents will make of their interviews, that’s where I would expect to find evidence or information about who else may have molested girls, if anyone. That information, those memos will be in the investigation files that the FBI and the Justice Department have not in the grand jury transcripts.

Jennifer Anton | 25:16

So are those files going to be released?

John Helms | 25:19

The Justice Department has not said exactly what they’re going to release, but I don’t think they will be releasing all of the files they’ve indicated that they will not, some talk of reconsidering that. 

And the reason is, those files will have names in them. We talked before about people being named. They will have names in them. Now, that doesn’t mean that the person did anything wrong. For example, there are a lot of reports saying that. Pam Bondi or the Justice Department has Brief Donald Trump that his name is in these investigative files.

Well, that could be nothing more than somebody remembering that he flew on Epstein’s plane one day. Which doesn’t mean he committed a crime, which doesn’t mean he did anything wrong at all. But if someone says, yeah, I remember Donald Trump being on Epstein’s plane. His name is in the files. Even though it doesn’t mean he’s done anything wrong. No one wants to have their name associated with Jeffrey Epstein. And so. You don’t want to have to defend yourself when people are asking questions about your name being mentioned, even though it’s not mentioned in any type of incriminating way. We saw the way President Trump reacted when he was accused of sending a birthday card to Jeffrey Epstein in 2002. Three years before the Palm Beach investigation started.

There’s nothing wrong with sending a birthday card to someone but he was outraged because he didn’t want his name even associated with him. So I think that, unless there is a reference to another person who actually was involved in molesting someone, just the fact that someone’s name is in a file somewhere, is dangerous to that person because it can be misused. It’s terrible publicity, even though it doesn’t mean you did anything wrong. 

For those reasons, I don’t think they’re going to release the entire investigation files because I don’t think First of all, I have no doubt that Donald Trump’s name is in the files. He and Jeffrey Epstein were really close friends for many years. That doesn’t mean that President Trump did anything wrong. But. I feel certain that in interviews, people would have just mentioned his name. So he’s not going to want just a mention of his name to come out. I suspect he will not want the investigation files released. So I don’t think they will come out while President Trump is still president for sure. After that, long after that, maybe by then, maybe we will have all moved on. So I don’t think it’ll happen anytime soon.

Jennifer Anton | 28:26

So let’s say the files aren’t released to the public, will there at least be some prosecutions against other people who from what I understand, have been accused of committing these acts alongside Jeffrey Epstein?

John Helms | 28:42

I don’t think so and the Justice Department has said that they’ve reviewed the files and that they don’t anticipate any further prosecutions. So I don’t think so.

Jennifer Anton | 28:52

Recently, the Justice Department met with Ghislane Maxwell, who is in prison. For these crimes. Is that correct? And what do we know about why did they interview her? What information were they hoping to acquire? What happened with that?

John Helms | 29:12

The reason they interviewed her is because obviously she was right there with Jeffrey Epstein for everything he was doing. And so she would have a lot of knowledge of things that he was doing, things that she was doing. But your question about why they interviewed her is interesting. I suspect that what they were hoping she would say, is that he’s not aware of any wrongdoing by Donald Trump. Or maybe Alan Dershowitz. I suspect that’s what they were hoping that she would say. I suspect they wanted her to clear them. But we don’t know what she said. And so. I doubt that. What she said is going to result in any more clarity about what other friends of Jeffrey Epstein may have been involved in molesting young girls. I doubt we’re going to see that and I don’t know if whether we will find out anytime soon what she did say.

Jennifer Anton | 30:32

That’s interesting. Okay. So, is there anything I haven’t asked you that you think you’d like to add? This is very informative and really interesting.

John Helms | 30:44

I do want to say something about the client list. Because that’s something that a lot of people have focused on. The so-called client list, like I mentioned earlier, something that in right-wing media and right-wing internet circles is taken almost as a given that there is such a list. The first thing I want people to think about. Is Why would there be a list of people that Epstein has maybe hooked up people with. Because remember, Jeffrey Epstein, there is no dispute, no doubt, Jeffrey Epstein is loved, to try to molest underage girls. He loved to do that himself. And he did that a lot. There is not any type of evidence that he was running a prostitution ring where people would come to him and pay him money.

And then he would provide them with an underage girl. There’s no evidence of that. No one’s ever said that happened. It’s more like. Jeffrey Epstein, just had lots of girls around him, and maybe he would hook up friends. Not for money, but he would just sort of hook them up. Because they were his friends. Now, If that’s the case, if he would occasionally hook up a friend with an underage girl, Why would he keep a list of his friends that he had hooked up underage girls with? He wouldn’t. He’s not going to make a list. I hooked up Prince Andrew this day. I hooked up Alan Dershowitz with this person. I hooked up Joe Smith with this. He’s not going to keep a list of that. 

He did have a so-called black book. But that was not a list of people that he hooked up with underage girls. That was a list of the underage girls. And he kept that because he wanted to be able to contact them if he wanted them to come over and give him one of these massages and molest them like that. So he had a list of the girls because he needed their contact information. But I don’t think he would have ever had made a list of his friends that he hooked up.

So that’s the first thing I want people to understand. The second thing is, the evidence that people point to. That a client list existed. Is this February interview on Fox News with Attorney General Pam Bondi, where she allegedly says that it’s on her desk. 

Now, she never actually uses the term client list. That is the interviewer. When she’s being interviewed, she’s being asked questions about President Trump wanting to release files about the JFK assassination, the Martin Luther King assassination, releasing these files because President Trump wants to be seen as the president of transparency. So, it’s in that context. That the question is asked. And the question is a little bit convoluted. It’s something like the president has said he wants to be transparent about things. He wants to release files. And we’ve heard about this, about an Epstein client list. Is that something that you’re planning to release? 

And she says, All of that is on my, or she says, it’s on my desk. I believe, because I’ve worked with lots and lots of witnesses, I believe that she was not focusing on the questions. She was not listening to the precise words of the question, and I don’t think she focused on the words client list. I believe, and when you’re media trained, you’re trained to stay on message. Keep expressing your talking points. Stick to your talking points. Her talking points, What she wanted to get out of the interview was that President Trump is releasing things. And I think she was trying to focus on, I’m reviewing things, I’m going to be allowing things to be released. And I don’t think she focused on the term client list in the questions.

So when she says it’s on my desk, She didn’t say the client list is on my desk. She says it’s on my desk. I think she was talking about all of the files that she is reviewing from the Epstein case cases and she’s going to determine what to release. I don’t think she meant to say specifically I have seen a client list and the client list is on my desk. So I think she misspoke. And that’s what she says happened. And I can tell you that. I’ve worked with hundreds of witnesses and very often people when they’re being questioned. Will not carefully listen to the question and will miss a key part of the question.

So as a lawyer, What I do when I have an opportunity to clear things up, is I would have said something, I would have asked a question like this. Madam Attorney General, you were asked, about some Jeffrey Epstein files and what’s going to happen with them. 

You were specifically asked about an Epstein-Rochstein client list. I want to make sure there’s no ambiguity about this. Have you seen an actual client list? And she’s probably going to say no. And then I’m going to ask her, When you were answering those questions, did you mean to refer specifically to a client list? No. That’s because you’ve never seen a client list. Is that right? Yes, that’s right. What were you referring to? I was referring to all of the Epstein files. I’m reviewing all of them. I didn’t focus on the term client list. I was just talking about all the files I was reviewing. So as a lawyer, at a trial or in a deposition, that’s how I would clean that up. So I don’t think she meant to say she had seen a client list, and I don’t believe it makes sense that one exists.

Jennifer Anton | 37:14

Well, John, this has been illuminating, clarifying. We hear so much noise about all of this Epstein information that you have really made it so much more. Easy, so much easier for all of us to understand. And I want to remind our guests today that this is John Helms. He’s a 30 year plus criminal defense attorney in Dallas, Texas, a former federal prosecutor who is extremely knowledgeable about this Epstein case and about the law here in Texas, especially criminal defense law. So John, thanks for being with us today. We really appreciate your time.

John Helms  | 37:52

Thanks for having me. It was my pleasure. 

Jennifer Anton | 37:53

Thank you.