Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

http://news.mit.edu/2020/faq-fact-finding-report-jeffrey-epstein-0110

by danso • 7 years ago

266 327 7 years ago

news.mit.edu

jdoliner2• 7 years ago

Sadly, this doesn't answer the most frequently asked question: Did Epstein kill himself?

fgonzag• 7 years ago

Why do you believe MIT would have this information?

jdoliner2• 7 years ago

I don't, it's just the most frequently asked question.

eesmith2• 7 years ago

"Releasing bad news or documents on a Friday afternoon in an attempt to avoid media scrutiny is often called a “Friday news dump” by members of the media." - https://politicaldictionary.com/words/friday-news-dump/

trentnix• 7 years ago

The report is the product of considerable work involving 73 interviews of 59 people and more than 610,000 documents and emails.

That's 10,000 documents and emails per person interviewed. How is that even possible?

zachberger• 7 years ago

I have 24k emails over the last year in my work email. I think this is fairly typical in large companies.

lostlogin• 7 years ago

In a University it is completely out of control. Every individual you ever meet or encounter electronically seems to generate an email or meeting invite from them, their university, their department, their school/faculty and from associated departments with a shared resource that you are required to understand. Sometimes it's multiple messages per day, and I haven't worked there in 3 years. Anacedata as I have only worked at one university.

kornish• 7 years ago

Presumably the documents and emails come from people besides the interviewees.

apetresc• 7 years ago

Those two things are not related. "Give me all the e-mails and Sharepoints on the Exchange server" and "I want to talk to these 59 people" are separate requests.

irjustin• 7 years ago

Likely - not all 610k documents are authored by those 59 people.

59 people are interesting to look at. 610k documents are related to the investigation probably by search/graph.

Realistically, not all 610k are read manually.

ehsankia5• 7 years ago

Also, the interactions span over 15 years.

busymom0• 7 years ago

Fairly certain that when they refer to “documents” it means pages

aneutron2• 7 years ago

This is besides the point of the article, but the link is in HTTP (no TLS but available with a correct certificate), and the report site which has the information linked in the article is also in HTTP (but has a bad TLS certificate).

shadowgovt11• 7 years ago

Why is this an issue?

djsumdog• 7 years ago

For an institution that claims to be an engineering leader, there's no real excuse for not having TLS everywhere with proper redirects today. It can prevent ISPs from seeing what you get or injecting their own code into webpages.

alias_neo3• 7 years ago

Perhaps not least of all that you'd expect a web page from MIT of all places to use a generally considered standard security practice of using TLS, particularly for information some might consider quite important.

jessaustin2• 7 years ago

By not enabling TLS, maybe they're hoping to get SEO penalties?

aneutron2• 7 years ago

I specifically wrote it was besides the point of the article, and that it was something I noticed and I thought was worth pointing out after reading the whole article and not having anything in particular to say about it.

akersten2• 7 years ago

Aren't you worried that a statement surrounding a person who is the subject of a possible international cover-up, might be a prime candidate for MitM-type tampering? Without HTTPS, how do you know what you're reading hasn't been subtly changed from the real statement MIT put out?

baybal22• 7 years ago

Why they hired a law firm to begin with?

mikeyouse• 7 years ago

Often times outside law firms handle investigations like this. MIT clearly had some failed policies where they were laundering the reputation of a despicable person for donations, which shouldn't happen. An internal investigation would be strongly biased to find no wrong-doing. Ostensibly, an outside investigation is more neutral (even though MIT is still paying for it so they're clearly biased to be soft too...)

shadowgovt11• 7 years ago

I found noteworthy that MIT recognized the risk of bias and attempted to control for it by retaining a second law firm (that had no history of working with MIT, whereas the first firm they retained has been used by MIT for previous tasks).

baybal22• 7 years ago

An internal investigation would be strongly biased to find no wrong-doing.

Yes, if there is a bias, it needs to come from somewhere? If feel it is like saying "If you haven't made a crime, you don't need an attorney." This doesn't make sense for most of people on your side of Atlantic, but try to get the rationale behind that.

Similarly, if they began talking of settlement fund, then for what they set it for to begin with, if this is a complete BS?

woofie11• 7 years ago

Well, the law firm in this case is basically an extension of MIT's in-house counsel. MIT has a long, long history with them, including whistleblower intimidation and other cover-ups.

shadowgovt11• 7 years ago

To conduct a fact-finding operation regarding MIT (and its members') interactions with Epstein and donations contributed by him to the university or its members.

http://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/

danso• 7 years ago

This is answered in part in the final q; so that the inquiry could have independence from MIT’s general counsel:

When Epstein’s donations to MIT were revealed, MIT’s general counsel retained Goodwin Procter, a law firm that has worked with the Institute in the past and that has extensive experience conducting internal investigations at academic institutions. That background allowed the firm to get up to speed quickly as it began its review. Soon thereafter, the Executive Committee engaged the law firm Paul Weiss, which also has extensive experience leading internal investigations and advising boards of directors but no prior relationship with MIT. From a governance perspective, the Executive Committee felt Paul Weiss’s independence from the Institute was valuable.

stefan_• 7 years ago

To protect the president, of course.

The report concludes that President L. Rafael Reif was not aware that the Institute was accepting donations from a convicted sex offender and accused pedophile

Following one of the two $50,000 donations, staff prepared a standard gift-acknowledgment letter to Epstein, and President Reif signed it on Aug. 16, 2012

malvosenior19• 7 years ago

The report itself is rather interesting:

http://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/files/MIT-report.pdf

After meeting Epstein in February 2013, Ito conducted what he described as “due diligence” into Epstein. Ito told us that he performed a Google search of Epstein and also spoke with certain individuals to learn more. According to Ito, the “influential” people with whom he spoke included Nicholas Negroponte, Media Lab co-founder and Professor Post-Tenure of Media Arts and Sciences; members of the Media Lab Advisory Council; tech billionaires, including a former LinkedIn senior executive and co-founder; and a well-known Harvard Law School professor. Ito also met other influential individuals at meetings with Epstein, including Woody Allen, a senior executive at the Hyatt Corporation, and a former prime minister of Israel. Ito explained that these meetings and discussions influenced his view of Epstein.

empath752• 7 years ago

and a well-known Harvard Law School professor.

almost certainly Alan Dershowitz, who is up to his eyeballs in epstein dirt.

malvosenior19• 7 years ago

Yes, and the LinkedIn co-founder is obviously Reid Hoffman. Here's a series of Tweets from Aanand Giridharadas talking about discovering some of this information and how they reacted to it:

https://twitter.com/AnandWrites/status/1169947031806365696

deng• 7 years ago

> and a well-known Harvard Law School professor.
almost certainly Alan Dershowitz, who is up to his eyeballs in epstein dirt.

My guess is Lawrence Lessig, since he himself wrote about this ("Our conversations then were about his diligence to determine whether Epstein remained an abuser"), see

https://medium.com/@lessig/on-joi-and-mit-3cb422fe5ae7

dls2016• 7 years ago

It was a PANTS ON massage!

azernik• 7 years ago

The the former Israeli Prime Minister probably being Barak; Israeli media has uncovered that Epstein gave him use of his NY apartment, and millions in investments.

ericb• 7 years ago

Makes one think twice about the value of social proof.

Epstein was like a landing page with customer logos from LinkedIn, Microsoft, MIT, and Harvard.

gumby14• 7 years ago

This is an excellent analogy.

_jal• 7 years ago

I think social proof is quite valuable, just not in a way that is positive for Ito, Dershowitz, Negroponte, etc.

Social proof has usefully demonstrated exactly what they are.

gumby14• 7 years ago

I replied "this is an excellent analogy" and it was voted down. On the assumption that I was too brief, I'll try again.

From the early 40s through the early 90s MIT was essentially entirely (> 80%) funded by various organs of the US government (I used to read the budget when I was a student, and nowadays the development office sends me the budget). With the end of the Cold War that era came to an end. Interestingly Nicholas Negroponte was one of the few who really recognized this and he set up the media lab on a different structure.*

MIT really struggled to make a transition, which it has only partially made progress on. And what I like about this analogy is that it is trading on someone else's judgement and reputation. The landing page and pitch deck that uses other peoples' logos (typically without permission which I think, in the pitch deck case at least, is just fine, as long as the usage is true). "Trust us! Our B2B solution is trusted by Coca-Cola, Airbus and Lyft!"

A lot of schools name buildings and courses after people. One thing I liked about the old MIT is that they didn't really: Building 2 actually has a name but who really knows it? There were a few exceptions, but they were few. One element of the "new" MIT is that they essentially sell their own credibility ("Steven Schwartzman school of computing is merely the most notorious" and also try to trade it in reverse "Steven Schwarzmann may be a scumbag but he thought we were worth giving money to". Harvard (from its very name) Stanford, etc have all been in on this game for decades and centuries; MIT is just trying to catch up.

* I have mixed feelings about his by that's an unrelated matter

krick3• 7 years ago

To the contrary, members of MIT’s Senior Team were wary of Epstein and nearly returned his May 2013 donation, the first donation of which they became aware

I love the word "nearly" here. Just saying.

hitekker• 7 years ago

Yep, they're trying to save face.

gumby14• 7 years ago

I love the institute but I agree they really need to think hard about how it runs.

The past 30 years have been a continuous project in weaning the institute off being merely a very large government research lab.* IMHO this process has not been successful.

* with a small school bolted onto the side: the educational side of the institute is only 16% of the budget and is run at a small loss. This might explain their interest in Epstein.

Jerry2• 7 years ago

Haven't seen this being discussed anywhere:

In addition to his own donations, Epstein claimed to have arranged for donations to MIT from other wealthy individuals. In 2014, Epstein claimed to have arranged for Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates to provide an anonymous $2 million donation to the Media Lab.

From the PDF linked above: http://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/files/MIT-report.pdf

malvosenior19• 7 years ago

Gates had close ties to Epstein:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/business/jeffrey-epstein-...

In fact, Epstein left his entire estate to Boris Nikolic (guy on the far right on that NYT picture). Nikolic worked for Gates for many years.

This is Gates emailing co-workers after visiting Epstein:

After the meeting, Epstein emailed friends and associates to boast, writing "Bill's great" in one email reviewed by The Times. In an email Gates sent to his own colleagues the next day, he wrote, "A very attractive Swedish woman and her daughter dropped by and I ended up staying there quite late."

The revelations about Epstein directing the $2M Gates donation to MIT first came out in Ronan Farrow The New Yorker piece on Joi Ito and MIT. Gates has denied it but given all the facts it seems very believable that Epstein did have something to do with that donation.

AndrewBissell7• 7 years ago

Ah yes, Woody Allen, the well-known judge of character when it comes to matters of child sexual abuse.

The "former prime minister of Israel" was probably Ehud Barak, who solicited $1 million in seed money from Epstein for his startup Carbyne, received large political donations from Epstein's benefactor Les Wexner, and was a frequent guest at Epstein's NYC mansion.

RcouF1uZ4gsC• 7 years ago

From the report

http://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/files/MIT-report.pdf

Professor Lloyd's dealings look very, very shady:

Professor Lloyd remained friends with Epstein after his conviction in 2008. He visited Epstein at his office in Florida during the period of Epstein’s criminal sentence. Professor Lloyd also visited Epstein’s private island, though for only a few hours for lunch, and he has acknowledged Epstein in his academic publications. While Professor Lloyd clearly valued Epstein as a source of potential funding, he also told us he believed that, by continuing to engage with Epstein post-conviction, he could be part of Epstein’s rehabilitation. Professor Lloyd told us that, in 2005 or 2006 (before Epstein’s conviction), Epstein gave him a personal $60,000 gift to support his MIT research that Professor Lloyd did not submit through MIT. In possible violation of MIT policies and certainly in violation of MIT norms, Professor Lloyd deposited the gift into a personal bank account and did not report it to MIT.
Eventually, in July 2016, Professor Lloyd affirmatively contacted Epstein by email to ask for funding to support his upcoming sabbatical. On June 1, 2017, Epstein emailed his accountant and Professor Lloyd: “send 125 k to mit for seth lloyd from gratitude.”

gautamcgoel• 7 years ago

Wow. Seth Lloyd is a very well-known name in Quantum Computing. It's pretty shady that he's depositing $50,000 gifts from known sex offenders directly into his personal bank account...

teachrdan• 7 years ago

It would appear to be $50,000 plus $125,000 if I'm reading that last note correctly.

rolltiide• 7 years ago

Q: What steps is MIT taking to ensure that its fundraising processes and practices are consistent with Institute values?

See most people have never been faced with the position of making sure convenient sums of money offered to them are consistent with the values they represent

preommr• 7 years ago

Can't these people just go to facebook and get like a 300k salary for a few years?

bobbles• 7 years ago

Does it seem strange that epstein would ask his accountant to move money around? Is this a normal accountant activity?

BryantD• 7 years ago

Yeah, it's normal. A personal accountant can and often will handle a lot of bookkeeper duties on top of the accounting work. See https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/04011... for more.

ergothus• 7 years ago

Professor Lloyd also visited Epstein’s private island, though for only a few hours for lunch,

I live a fairly privileged life as a U.S. West Coast techie...and stopping at a private island for a few hours sounds crazy. Do non-billionaire people (active academics at that) really lead lives like this? `

perennate4• 7 years ago

It is typical for academics to visit both potential and current sponsors to discuss research funding and collaborations. It is not typical for sponsors to own private islands, and I think visiting for a day is common but a few hours sounds short (but for a one-day visit, the discussions themselves would only be a few hours). These visits are generally paid for by the sponsor (flights, hotels).

nikhizzle• 7 years ago

I imagine he was on St. Thomas, and took a small boat over.

closeparen• 7 years ago

In my upper-middle-class life, I’ve been an invited guest in some pretty mind-boggling old-money spaces a handful of times. Lots of kids growing up had stories from a week on their crazy rich family friend’s palatial vacation property or mega-yacht. At a highly selective university, the son of a teacher or an accountant might be dating the daughter of a household name CEO.

Those people do sometimes have friends like us & a desire to entertain.

morelisp2• 7 years ago

"Hobnob with the billionaire global elite" was a core part of Epstein's pitch to academics to launder his reputation.

https://newrepublic.com/article/154826/jeffrey-epsteins-inte...

undersuit• 7 years ago

The friends of billionaires do, I would argue. Why would Epstein leave his private island to go to lunch in a public location in Boston when he can entertain his guest at his home?

Alex3917• 7 years ago

Do non-billionaire people (active academics at that) really lead lives like this?

If a billionaire calls you up and tells you they're sending their plane to pick you up if you're interested in going, then yes. That's fairly common, in terms of billionaires sending their planes to pick folks up they want to meet with, or letting others hitch a ride.

amiga_500• 7 years ago

“If poor people knew how rich rich people are, there would be riots in the streets”

meddlepal• 7 years ago

From my experience, Academics do get around. I know a lot (mostly humanities) that are social butterflies and travel to a lot of exotic locations thanks to wealthier friends and benefactors.

I think there's this view that academics are quiet home body book worms, but that's flawed. Adjuntcs maybe, but definitely not tenured professors.

smsm423• 7 years ago

When I worked as a freelancer, in the dotcom era, I've participated in a number of projects led by some rich people. That included having meetings in their personal homes (some of them conduct a lot of business from their home office, apparently). For most of them, I had very vague idea who they are outside of the project I was in (some of them were rich enough so I tangentially heard about them before, some weren't) and if they conducted some nefarious crap in secret, I would never know. There weren't private islands involved, but I don't think it's too far out necessarily if you upgrade from a nobody IT freelancer to the leading MIT researcher.

So, if that lunch happened _before_ Epstein conviction, I'd give some benefit of the doubt. After, "not with a ten mile pole" is the appropriate policy and any other conduct is on him.

sequoia2• 7 years ago

Professor Lloyd also visited Epstein’s private island, though for only a few hours for lunch

Normally one would give the benefit of the doubt, but given the abhorrent acts people were perpetrating or turning a blind eye to in this case, I'm inclined not to. Hence this question of fact:

Unless there are credible witnesses attesting to the fact that he spent his few hours on that island eating lunch, the report should refrain from speculation and simply say "he visited Epstein's island for a few hours." We don't know what he was doing.

voxic11• 7 years ago

I think the claim that he was stopping by for lunch is important to report on. But it should have been presented as a claim along with the source of the claim, rather than just asserted as fact.

mlyle2• 7 years ago

Normally one would give the benefit of the doubt, but given the abhorrent acts people were perpetrating or turning a blind eye to in this case, I'm inclined not to.

I think this is a dangerous way to look at things... Just because there's a lot of shady people doing awful things, doesn't mean we should tar everyone who associated with the person.

Whatever other things happened with other people doesn't really matter. Instead we should look at the facts for each case (visited Epstein's island where bad things had happened, and accepted money from Epstein in an unusual way).

SkyMarshal• 7 years ago

To be honest it's not even clear that "for a few hours" is fact. It doesn't appear to be footnoted or sourced in the report.

Visiting a private island in the Caribbean from your home base in Boston is a full day affair. Total one-way travel time from MIT campus to that island is about half a day. Seems at least as likely to have been an overnight trip.

AlanYx2• 7 years ago

My jaw dropped when I read page 9 of the report, it says "Professor Minsky (who passed away in 2016) had worked with Epstein to organize an off-campus conference on artificial intelligence that same year."

That's quite a charitable characterization! The conference in question wasn't just any "off-campus conference" -- it was held on Epstein's island.

Minsky had also organized a two-day symposium on Epstein's island several years prior (in 2002), a fact also totally omitted from the report.

3fe9a03ccd14ca53• 7 years ago

Ugh. Everything about that island creeps me out. Hopefully someone (maxwell) is talking about what really happened there.

throwaway212102• 7 years ago

Harvard Professor Mark Newman also has similar shading dealings with Epstein. His own book, SuperCooperators [1], has nearly 3 whole pages dedicated to describing his experiences on Jeffery Epstein's Island, thanking him for all his support and basically sucking up to him by describing his (Epstein's) incredible intelligence. Stephen Hawking even makes an appearance in these stories with a talk about how Epstein rented a submarine so Hawking could experience being underwater. Epstein occurs so frequently in Newman's own book that he even is listed in the index (you can view the index on amazon for free). The book was published in 2011 after Epstein's first convictions.

I find it very hard to believe all these scientist didn't know what was going on nor would I be surprised to find out they participated in it.

[1] (https://www.amazon.com/SuperCooperators-Altruism-Evolution-O...)

mlyle2• 7 years ago

Yah-- Epstein did something nice for Hawking -- unknown if before or after the conviction-- therefore one can reasonably expect that Hawking knew Epstein was raping underage girls on his island and that Hawking participated. /s

selfishgene2• 7 years ago

So many people left academia after completing their PhD because they could not find legitimate funding to continue their research.

Lloyd should resign from MIT immediately. There is simply no excuse for soliciting money from a child trafficking racketeer like Jeffrey Epstein.

If your research is worth pursuing, compete honestly for federal research grants like everyone else.

thatsenough3• 7 years ago

What would Epstein get from Lloyd?

If Epstein was in fact blackmailing the rich and famous, or running a sex trafficking operation for profit, how does he benefit from supplying donations (and whatever else he allegedly supplied) to a quantum computing professor?

malvosenior19• 7 years ago

Epstein was most likely backed by Israel, so you should ask what they would want with quantum computing.

onetimemanytime• 7 years ago

Once you slipped and accepted the "gift," he and all Epstein's handlers had the person by the, you know what. So after that, nothing is rational.

I also think it's easy to say "how could they do x and y with a 17 year old..." but humans are made of flesh and blood.

ericfrenkiel• 7 years ago

Epstein didn't kill himself.

Video footage "accidentally" deleted and the backup footage also lost due to "technical errors."

His death and a cleanup so slovenly and brazenly done in front of the public eye is a mockery of America as a nation of "liberty and justice for all."

zamalek• 7 years ago

Irrespective of the trueness or falseness of this, it is completely off-topic.

JasonFruit• 7 years ago

It is off-topic, but that's not uncommon on HN — and it's certainly one of the most important points that can be made from the Epstein case.

tptacek• 7 years ago

This comment is downvoted, but shouldn't be: "Epstein didn't kill himself" clearly is off-topic for the thread, and the resulting "discussion" ate the whole thread. 'zamalek is absolutely right.

dr_dshiv• 7 years ago

Kind of impressive, and nice in a way - - since it is so obviously corrupt and we become aware of it because the case is so high profile. Makes you wonder who pulled it off and how often things like it occur.

root_axis• 7 years ago

The attorney general confirmed it was a suicide, so if we're to believe it was actually a surreptitious murder, it goes all the way to the top.

roenxi• 7 years ago

Epstein might still be alive and the whole thing some sort of elaborate witness protection scheme to protect him from all of the people who want him dead. So there might not be corruption all the way to the top.

Corruption seems like an easier explanation though.

onlyrealcuzzo4• 7 years ago

This happens MUCH less today than at any time in the past. Only 2 generations ago, stuff like this was happening on a daily basis everywhere in the world. This was basically what justice used to be.

The world is not fair. There is little justice. But it's more fair and just than it's ever been before, by far. Maybe we've taken a step back in the last 10 years. It's hard to say. But compared to even 50 years ago, we are so far ahead it's unbelievable. 100 years, and it's basically a different world.

Ohn0• 7 years ago

"America" is different than "everywhere in the world"

mannykannot• 7 years ago

Well, that seems to be a fact, but it is not a reason to not regard it as suspicious, and not a reason to not investigate.

kowolkian• 7 years ago

Holding up Epstein’s likely murder as evidence of progress is deeply fucked up. I hope you have values.

elfexec• 7 years ago

This happens MUCH less today than at any time in the past.

Really? You know this how?

Only 2 generations ago, stuff like this was happening on a daily basis everywhere in the world.

And it magically stopped?

This was basically what justice used to be.

As opposed to justice now being what money can buy?

But it's more fair and just than it's ever been before

I disagree. The world is just as fair and just as it's ever been before. This is just recency bias like how the enlightenment crowd painted the period before them as the "dark ages" where no learning or progress was made.

But compared to even 50 years ago, we are so far ahead it's unbelievable.

Maybe if we cherrypick some parts or aspects.

100 years, and it's basically a different world.

Humans are still humans.

Things aren't as terrible as you think they were. Things aren't as terrible today as some think. Things aren't as great as some think they were. Things aren't as great today as some think.

krick3• 7 years ago

We all kind of know that, yet it still remain just a "conspiracy theory" which no decent person will dare to publicly acknowledge. Yeah, another one.

alexis_fr• 7 years ago

“Suicide” is also a totally unfounded accusation on paar with a conspiracy theory: There isn’t a single proof of suicide. Yet all the newspapers repeated it gullibly until social media made it impossible to ignore the opposite. So why wasn’t this affirmation entirely disqualified first hand?

At best, the doctor can affirm that Epstein died. Little more. Suicide is associating a storytelling, a blatantly lying storytelling in the face of the public as long as no proof of intent was even available when the suicide was affirmed. We basically know nothing on the circumstances of his death, so the suicide word was more than unfounded.

Waterluvian6• 7 years ago

Great claims require great evidence. Your claim makes me increasingly skeptical, but I require a lot more.

What is the best, least crackpot looking resource to dig into the _facts_?

grey-area5• 7 years ago

The cctv footage existed, it has now been ‘accidentally deleted’.

The chances of this happening on a high profile case are infinitesimally small. So on the contrary the great claim requiring evidence is that this was a completely normal suicide in prison. Where is the evidence this video was deleted by mistake?

https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2020/01/10/us/09reuters-peop...

briandear• 7 years ago

The claim that he killed himself should also require evidence.

at-fates-hands• 7 years ago

A lot of the evidence seems to be anecdotal. I've heard multiple interviews of people who have worked in various functions over the years at MCC where Epstein was being held.

All have noted how tight the security is (its often referred to as the "Gitmo of the East"), how so many failures would have to occur for him to be able to do what he did without anybody seeing it happen, or not have someone realize he was trying to kill himself and stop it.

I remember an interview with a high level jail admin and when asked about Epstein and what happened, he just laughed. The host asked why he was laughing and he basically said, "I worked there for 15 years, no way this happens with the security they have there. Someone was paid off or it was an inside job. There's no doubt in my mind when I consider the kind of people Epstein was linked to."

remarkEon• 7 years ago

I've got no "facts" for you, but, and I've said this before here, if Epstein was about to testify in court about organized crime or a murder allegedly committed by a Mafia member no one here would be questioning the idea that he was murdered.

That he was in deep with very, very powerful people for a long time that are in the public eye we now somehow have to apply greater scrutiny to the evidence. Just, gobbledygook.

Perhaps we should realize that there really isn't much difference between the Mafia and generational political families.

mhh__2• 7 years ago

I think it's more likely that he or people around him pulled strings so he could kill himself rather than he be killed.

wwweston• 7 years ago

If he's powerful enough to pull strings to kill himself, why wouldn't he pull strings to disappear?

If I want a conspiracy theory involving Epstein's power here, it's going to be that this is how you disappear if you're powerful enough, and the phrase "Epstein didn't kill himself" is correct not because his death wasn't a suicide, but because it's not his death.

ww5204• 7 years ago

Funny how the players are all intertwined in the loss of the suicide video.

https://i.redd.it/6pg6wj8toy941.png

dguaraglia4• 7 years ago

Not in the picture: the President of the United States and very close friend to Epstein, Donald Trump.

pastor_elm• 7 years ago

occam's razor says you're wrong.

lkschubert82• 7 years ago

Occam's razor isn't a law, just a heuristic.

harry8• 7 years ago

You toss a coin 8 times and are told you get 8 heads, you wanted tails, the person reporting this to you wanted heads on each occasion. By occam's razor is 8 heads a simpler explanation than you were lied to?

One toss, you couldn't really detect much smell. But 8? Does it stink?

Any one of these things, camera footage x2, cell mate, suicide watch removal, plea deal, guards asleep x2, association with the current president, Bill Clinton, actual royalty, just for starters... and we can keep going with these coincidences.

Any one, fine, happens. Any three, ok, weird, but not totally outside expectation. But we're kind of beyond that. It just stinks. If it's all just a massive coincidence that all these independent things "just happened" that needs support because it seems the assumption that all those events are independent is shaky, at best. Shaky by occam's razor heuristic.

0.9^8 is less than 50%

So it should be looked at closely on principle. With or without support from occam's razor.

GhostVII• 7 years ago

What actual evidence do you have that he was murdered? I think it is much more likely that someone who was going to be in prison for the rest of his life, and who previously attempted suicide, killed himself rather than being murdered by someone in the prison. There is footage of the guards falsifying time sheets, so to me it seems like a pretty clear case of negligence. I recall reading an FBI report about the suicide, where they said that they watched footage of the outside of the cell at the time of his suicide, but I can't find it back.

nabnob• 7 years ago

I've seen some articles written by former MIT Media Lab employees, and they made it seem like Epstein's involvement and history was basically an open secret that they weren't allowed to mention in emails or documents.

There was a Medium article that said Epstein brought young Eastern European women (likely trafficked) with him to campus. (If I can find it I will edit this comment) I think it says a lot about their culture, that people working there are encouraged to look the other way when a billionaire is involved.

Also, looking at the report, it is obvious that Ito was completely aware of Epstein's history, and the risks of associating with him, but continued to invite him to MIT's campus.

thrwn_frthr_awy4• 7 years ago

In September, in response to revelations about engagements between MIT and Jeffrey Epstein...

This isn't true, right? MIT knew about those engagements from as far back as 2013. This is the first sentence in the first answer to the first question and it just isn't correct. What _actually_ happened in September is a bunch of fucking terrible press for MIT. This whole thing is just so sad and at the end of all this is a bunch of human beings who were treated so poorly by some, and in some ways almost worse, treated indifferently by so many others.

perennate4• 7 years ago

The sentence reads:

In September, in response to revelations about engagements between MIT and Jeffrey Epstein, President Reif and the Executive Committee of the MIT Corporation asked MIT's general counsel to retain a law firm to design and conduct a review of the facts surrounding those engagements.

It is the case that Goodwin Procter's fact-finding investigation began in September. And the report details interactions in 2012 and 2013, including who was aware of what at the time. You can read the report here: http://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/files/MIT-report.pdf

thrwn_frthr_awy4• 7 years ago

I still don't understand. They knew in 2013. What exactly does "in response to revelations" mean then? What was the revelation? They've known. That sentences is bullshit and misleading at best.

gumby14• 7 years ago

The point is revelation outside MIT. The report is pretty clear that Epstein's presence was discussed frequently internally -- and okayed.

The amount of money he donated is infinitesimal by MIT's standards. They must have been convinced there was tons more to come.

thrwn_frthr_awy4• 7 years ago

I'm not denying the report is clear, as that wasn't written by MIT, but an independent 3rd party. The FAQ is written by MIT and I believe the first sentence is not clear to someone who isn't familiar with the history. The FAQ should stand on its own without the report or else what good is it.

sxcurry• 7 years ago

1) Negroponte responded: “I know him quite well. The person who is his closest friend is Marvin Minsky, who even visited him in jail. I would take Berlusconi’s money, so why not Jeff.” (By March 2013, Berlusconi, the former Prime Minister of Italy, had been accused of hiring underaged prostitutes and dating underaged girls.)

2)“I’ve also talked to Nicholas [Negroponte] as well who had met him and he also agrees that we should treat Jeffrey with respect.”

3)Negroponte pushed back on concealing Epstein’s attendance, responding (in part) “Of course he can come and would be welcome …. I would make absolutely no fuss over his coming and welcome home [sic] 100%.”

Wow, just wow, are there no depths too low?

gumby14• 7 years ago

I'm really surprise Marvin visited him in jail. It's not out of character of him (he was really a kind human) but I'm surprised he had that close a relationship.

I like Nicholas a lot but some of his remarks do surprise me.

malvosenior19• 7 years ago

Marvin Minsky was accused of assaulting Virgina Guiffre. Virginia had been trafficked by Epstein starting when she was 15.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/08/new-details-in-unsea...

Giuffre also alleges Epstein and Maxwell told her to have sex with former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson; former Democratic Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell; the late MIT computer scientist Marvin Minsky; and MC2 model agency cofounder Jean Luc Brunel, as well as an unnamed “prince,” “foreign president,” and owner of “a French hotel chain.” Giuffre previously alleged she had been forced by Epstein and Maxwell to have sex with lawyer Alan Dershowitz and Britain’s Prince Andrew.

AlanYx2• 7 years ago

Minsky had been close with Epstein for years. Minsky had even organized two events on Epstein's island, a two day symposium in 2002 (not mentioned in the report) and a full conference in December 2011 (this appears to be mischaracterized as 2012 in the report). I see another poster has commented about Giuffre's allegations.

9HZZRfNlpR• 7 years ago

Age of consent in Italy is 14, like many other European countries. Underage prostitutes not.

Taniwha• 7 years ago

But prostitution below the age of 18 is illegal

AndrewBissell7• 7 years ago

I think "14" is reasonably understood as "underaged girl" even if there are countries where the age of consent is that low. At any rate "it was technically not illegal in such-and-such jurisdiction" is hardly a robust defense of middle-aged men "dating" girls barely in their teens.

gumby14• 7 years ago

Apparently Reif's job was on the line too. I was surprised he survived

totalZero6• 7 years ago

Reif should resign.

3fe9a03ccd14ca53• 7 years ago

I trust Barr with regards to Epstein’s death being a suicide. The scandal there would be who allowed him to kill himself not necessarily who killed him.

What boggles my mind is why they’re being so tight lipped about the investigation. The island was swarming with FBI, including scuba divers. Why not a single statement? Nothing!

pledess• 7 years ago

Epstein was joined by one or two female assistants who appeared to be in their twenties, which made some people uncomfortable ... A Media Lab staff member told us that she was "grossed out" during of one Epstein's visits to the Media Lab, both because ... and because Epstein brought female assistants in their twenties with him.

Is anyone interpreting this as "At MIT, it's reasonable to be prejudiced against young women who claim to have a job in the philanthropy field. Anyone actually qualified for such a job would have a different age or a different gender."? If I'm a professor elsewhere and visit MIT to talk about my research, can my female graduate student (who did most of the work) safely visit at the same time, or will she run into the same prejudice? Does the answer depend on her physical appearance?

morelisp2• 7 years ago

Most everyone else is interpreting this in the context of Epstein trafficking young women from eastern europe, because that's what he did.

If you interpret it as you describe instead, I also desperately hope you are not a professor and don't visit MIT.

pvg2• 7 years ago

People are, quite sensibly, prejudiced against someone convicted of sex crimes involving the exploitation of young women traveling with young women. The prejudice is against him, not the women. The incident and the reactions of the staff involved has been documented in greater detail elsewhere, you can just google it up.

gowld2• 7 years ago

To avoid the appearance of impropriety, should people avoid hiring female assistants? I hope not.

ty___ler• 7 years ago

He trafficked underage sex slaves

scarejunba• 7 years ago

You know, I was thinking to myself what it would take to take Epstein money. How much would count? And the truth is that no amount really works. Most of us middle-class folk would probably say no pretty fast if offered the choice because the best way to stay safe from the mob is to not let it turn its Eye of Sauron on you. The instinct that keeps me far is less morality than self-preservation. Epstein himself had billions and he died in a jail cell. I'd take the deal if I were destitute, though.

Interestingly, lots of these people weren't destitute. But these people (more intelligent than I am) fell for a trick I would have fallen for a hundred times faster: the slow drip. "Come visit my island. I'll fly you there". Of course I say "yes". Then when I'm there, everyone is busy having sex with kids. I'm standing there like gawking like an idiot. I have no sex with kids. I'm the only one who will say that. I'm already screwed. Well played, mob, well played. If I whistle blow the kid-screwing then they'll get in front of me. I'll commit suicide because apparently I had this secret paedophilia. The Internet will say "Well, junba wasn't a trustworthy guy ultimately. They found child porn on his computer". I'm not saying that some of the guys were innocent. I'm saying that given the existence of adversaries bent on information manipulation, no one external can determine if you're innocent or not. Better to stay far from the Eye of Sauron.

ezekg• 7 years ago

Anybody else remember the death of Reddit co-founder Aaron Swartz? And what role MIT played in it? And the “conspiracy theories” surrounding his death? It may be a good time to look at that again.

_r4su2• 7 years ago

Also don't forget that Rafael Reif was responsible for orchestrating the massive coverup of fraud at MIT Lincoln Laboratory regarding Ted Postol's allegations of fraudulent missile defense tests:

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/401412/postol-vs-the-pent...

If the Department of Defense had not punted on the investigation, then provost Rafael Reif and his supervisor president Susan Hockfield would be serving time in a federal penitentiary with former dean of MIT Sloan School of Management Gabriel Bitran

https://money.cnn.com/2014/08/12/investing/mit-professor-sca...

instead of sending thank-you notes to one of the most depraved child molesters of the 20th century.

Shame on Reif and Hockfield!

rdtsc• 7 years ago

At the end of the discussion, there was a consensus, reached by Morgan, Ruiz, and Newton, to keep Epstein’s $100,000 donation to the Media Lab and to accept further donations from him so long as: (1) each donation would be recorded as anonymous, and Epstein could not publicize it; (2) the donations would be relatively small; and (3) the donations would be unrestricted.

Right, they thought really hard about it and their moral compass told them to sweep it under the carpet.

Then the emails from Ito to Newton and the others at Resource Development are interesting. Here is one, Ito tries hard convince others to let him keep the money.

I’m actively developing the relationship with Jeffrey Epstein and I’d like to know your thinking on this. More important than this $100K is what happens if he is interested in a much larger gift. My previous understanding was that if it was not accounted or named—or if the gift might be given anonymously—it was likely to be OK.

He is dangling future bags of money in front of them. "Just think of all the funding we could be getting. And look, we've already hid it as anonymous before, surely we can do it again".

That's some very effective tactics. Epstein did that too, he started giving smaller amounts of money first to see how it goes. Those processed, people made excuses. Once that happened they were hooked into the scheme and ready to be roped in even more. Ito was using the same tactics.

rantwasp• 7 years ago

this whole thread bothers me, but not for the usual reasons.

1) everyone is up on their high horses pretending that they somehow have an absolute moral compass that would prevent them from doing any wrong. To me it looks like people over at MIT are trying to do the right thing (with this external investigation) and maybe there will be some lessons learned from this whole episode.

2) everyone is outraged (rightfully) at what this guy/monster did but I believe we are missing a bigger point here: people abuse power every damn day. people fuck over people in a weak position - that cannot defend themselves - every damn day. It sounds like some lives are more important than other when it comes to capturing the moral highground. What about minimum wage workers living in poverty, people that deperately need health care or civilians in war zones? Nobody gives a damn about what has become the new normal, but we're outraged that some guy had assistants in their 20s and basically ran a prostitution ring on his island.

3) a subset of the same people that probably visited the island have decided to silence the guy because he probably knew too much. The same people that had no problem having sex with underage, sexually exploited girls, decided to abuse their power once more. And we're outraged that a bunch of MIT professors took donations to pursuit their research.

Honestly at this point I would just let law enforcement do their thing and would focus on preventing/exposing situations such of this vs being revisionists about what should have been done.

gurkendoktor• 7 years ago

I agree with 2), but the Epstein case was closely related to the HN bubble, so it's only natural that people get worked up about it.

Honestly at this point I would just let law enforcement do their thing

I don't think this will happen. Look at the phenomenal outcome of this underage prostitution case, which (from what we know) sounds pretty boring in comparison:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Dutroux#Deaths_of_potenti...

Something about sex trafficking seems to bring out the hitmen really quick.

0x262d2• 7 years ago

Our ruling class is chock full of pedophiles and rapists (Trump, Bill Clinton, Epstein, etc) and because they have all the power and wealth, it gradually filters down to other institutions that depend on sponsorship like MIT. This is what is sometimes called bourgeois decadence.

0x262d2• 7 years ago

Epstein was convicted of sex trafficking an underage girl in 2008, by the way, long before many of MIT’s dealings with him. literally convicted, which is surprising! he got a 13 month sentence and spent most of it on “work release” because that is how justice works for billionaires as long as they don’t threaten other billionaires.

avalys• 7 years ago

Can someone explain to me what harm was caused by MIT accepting anonymous donations from Jeffrey Epstein? As an MIT alum I don't understand what the problem is.

fatbird2• 7 years ago

It allowed Epstein to launder his reputation as a sexual predator and trafficker. Even with his donations recorded as "anonymous", he remained a conduit and effective networker for the Media Lab. Bill Gates donated $2,000,000, IIRC, to the Media Lab through Epstein. As part of his continued networking as a big dollar donor, Epstein continued using his private island to abuse and traffic underage women.

Basically, once his reputation was in tatters following his conviction, the Media Lab and various individuals found it profitable to rent their reputations (and MIT's) to Epstein.

selfishgene2• 7 years ago

The same reason that you don't do business with organized crime.

eesmith2• 7 years ago

They weren't really anonymous. Those who needed to know, knew. The details were just hidden from the general public.

"Really anonymous" might be to set up a trust, interact through a lawyer, where MIT receives no information about the person behind the scenes.

But people at MIT knew, and it helped him make connections with other people.

In addition, the donations were reciprocated. One example (going from memory, so might have details wrong) was that one of the labs was asked to make a gift for Epstein.

cjbprime5• 7 years ago

“Have you managed to talk to many of my friends?”
Epstein had been supplying me the phone numbers of important scientists and financiers and media figures. “Do you understand what an extraordinary group of people they are, what they have accomplished in their fields?"

-- http://nymag.com/news/features/41826/

awb2• 7 years ago

we now see that the donations totaled $850,000

Why would Epstein donate $850k to MIT?

_y6bf• 7 years ago

A large defense contractor in Massachusetts conducted research for the CIA in support of its post-9/11 enhanced interrogation program. Stephen Kosslyn, formerly affiliated with the Harvard psychology department, helped this defense contractor win the contract and served as an academic advisor to the program for the CIA.

Kosslyn was also responsible for creating a position for Jeffrey Epstein at Harvard in the psychology department, according to a recent report published by Harvard's president Lawrence Bacow.

Given Epstein's alleged connection to CIA, one wonders what role it played in helping land this disgraceful $20 million program in in this defense contractor's lap?

jacquesm2• 7 years ago

After the report on Aaron Swartz I have very low expectations, in fact I expect another MIT whitewash. I'll read it to see if that's the case.

_ebyg• 7 years ago

There is a good reason why Rafael Reif only appears in public these days flanked on all sides by brutes from the MIT police department.

During the Vietnam War, Dean Epps was placed under citizen's arrest by the students of Harvard University (as he famously yelled back at them: "Unhand me, you mother-fuckers!") for that organization's complicity in what the UN has now ruled a war crime:

https://www.salon.com/2011/11/11/occupy_harvard_gets_the_old...

Got to wish protesters today the best of luck getting anywhere near that close to Rafael Reif, with the police detail that he needs to hide behind in order to protect his filthier-than-dirt, self-rationalizing ass from those who might attempt to hold him publicly accountable.

freestylerr• 7 years ago

What appears surprising to me is how easy the funded researchers apparently got away with it.

- Profs Lloyd and Oxman, still in service

- Joscha Bach, who is the VP of research at the AI foundation (https://aifoundation.com/about/), and declined to comment. I don’t know whether someone with such track record should be educating on the future of AI?

DayDollar• 7 years ago

The best shield for the devious are the innocent and idealists. If you murder someone and burry them in your back yard - invite the police over for a bbq.

throwaway91138• 7 years ago

I find the whole Epstein thing to be full fledged Puritan Rage Culture.

Start with the crimes of the man himself. He had young women and girls around and gave them money in exchange for sexual acts. This is something society doesn't like to think about explicitly, but might these young females have actually chosen/wanted this? The typical answer is: They were underage and vulnerable therefor anything they did doesn't imply consent. That is a very condescending view. The age of legal consent in the US is 16 in many states and as low as 11 under some circumstances! In the charges against him it says:

"Once minor victims were recruited, EPSTEIN or his employees or associates would contact victims to schedule appointments for “massages.” As a result, many victims were abused by EPSTEIN on multiple subsequent occasions."

"To further enable him to abuse underage girls, EPSTEIN asked and enticed certain of his victims to recruit additional minor girls to perform “massages” and similarly engage in sex acts with EPSTEIN. When a victim would recruit another underage girl for EPSTEIN, he paid both the victim-recruiter and the new victim hundreds of dollars in cash. Through these victim-recruiters, EPSTEIN maintained a steady supply of new victims to exploit, and gained access to dozens of additional underage girls to abuse."

https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/jeffrey-epstein-charged...

These account make it clear to me, that these girls were not helpless victims suffering at the hands of an abuser. That just doesn't scale. 100s of girls agreeing to be scheduled again and again (without use of force threat or violence), and to recruit other girls means that it wasn't that bad. I know this is something "you can't say" hence the throwaway.

I'm not saying that there wasn't any foul play, or that Epstein was a great guy. Far from it. But that he is very different from someone who physically abuses a helpless prepubescent child with violence. In a way treating both these cases as "pedophilic sex offences" is offensive to victims of the latter. My point is that society needs to re-embrace Proportionality.

We wrote this man off as pure Evil, so anything he touches must be Evil too. We don't allow any positive attribution to his actions. Any money he gives is tainted money only used to launder his reputation. Any person that has ever come into contact with him, let alone had any positive thought about him, is also Evil. Why is accepting donations from him frame the person or organization as endorsing child abuse? Why is having a photo with him, or being at a dinner party with him mark you as suspect? Why shouldn't have MIT accept donations from him? Should Apple (or your startup) not sell to "known sex offenders" or other convicted criminals?

Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

Related Stories