In his new book, Trump Attorney General Bill Barr rejects conspiracy theories surrounding the death of disgraced financier and convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein.
Awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges in 2019, Epstein was found dead in his cell at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center.
The medical examiner ruled his death a suicide, but baseless conspiracy theories swirled that he had been killed because he retained information concerning high profile individuals’ actions with underage girls.
Reports that proper prison procedures had not been followed only spurred on speculation.
But in the book One Damn Thing After Another, which was obtained by Fox News Digital, Mr Barr pushes back on the claims that Epstein’s death was nefarious.
“The New York City medical examiner had conducted an autopsy and ruled that Epstein killed himself by hanging. Other evidence also pointed to suicide, but it was the video evidence that confirmed the medical examiner’s finding,” Mr Barr writes.
“I personally reviewed that video footage,” he adds. “It shows conclusively that between the time Epstein was locked in his cell at 7.49pm on the night of August 9 and the time he was discovered the next morning at 6.30am, no one entered his tier.”
Mr Barr noted that “a perfect storm of failures” preceded Epstein’s death and that the “fact that so many failures occurred at one time understandably led people to suspect the worst”.
The former top law enforcement official wrote that the mistakes included Epstein being taken off suicide watch despite an earlier attempt at ending his life and leaving him alone in his cell after his cellmate was transferred.
Two correction officers who were supposed to be keeping an eye on Epstein also slept on the job and spent time online. They later pled guilty following accusations that they tried to cover their tracks by falsifying records.
“As for Epstein,” Mr Barr writes, “it was no consolation to me that an odious criminal was dead. He should have been given a fair trial and, if found guilty, made to answer for his crimes. That he was not is deeply disappointing to me”.
