The death of millionaire intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein behind bars ought to set off “system-wide self-reflection” on how prisoners are handled, Epstein’s lawyer tells RT – and it will set off conspiracy theories for years to come back.
Metropolitan Correctional Center “is type of like an American gulag for individuals who haven’t been convicted of something,” Epstein lawyer Marc Fernich tells RT. Insisting the rich pedophile was not a “safety threat,” Fernich laments that the prosecution painted him as an “distinctive flight threat and hazard” – geared up as he was with not less than one phony passport, a non-public jet, and a substantial fortune – and left him to languish in “uncivilized circumstances” which took their toll on his thoughts and physique.
MCC is “institutionally ill-equipped” to cope with somebody like Epstein who would not final lengthy in normal inhabitants however who is not a hardened legal, Fernich explains. “This is among the hardest pre-trial detention services in the nation. And the circumstances are inhumane.” Epstein, he insists, was “presumed harmless,” regardless of his 2008 conviction for soliciting underage prostitutes – half of a slap-on-the-wrist plea deal the fallout from which culminated in this 12 months’s intercourse trafficking expenses – and shouldn’t have been confined in such “barbaric” circumstances.
“What this death calls for is self-reflection, system-wide self-reflection and a chance to look in the mirror and determine what we will do higher as a system,” Fernich says, pointing to the “cascading sequence of occasions” that began with the judge denying Epstein’s bail. “Epstein didn’t belong locked up pending trial, and he didn’t belong in a hellhole like that earlier than even being convicted of something.”
“The defendant, even considered one of Epstein’s means, must be on equal footing with the federal government when presumed harmless to allow them to pretty combat the expenses. And once you cage someone like that in uncivilized circumstances, they don’t seem to be ready to try this,” Fernich says. He solely marvels that MCC inmates do not kill themselves extra usually.
Fernich insists he would not need to see any “sacrificial lambs” scapegoated for his shopper’s death – “these folks often attempt to do their greatest.” The scapegoating has arguably already begun, nevertheless – the now-former appearing head of the Bureau of Prisons was eliminated by Attorney General William Barr 9 days after Epstein’s death, and the warden for MCC was reassigned to a different facility inside days of his demise. The two guards tasked with watching Epstein on the time of his death – considered one of whom was not truly a guard, and each of whom have been working time beyond regulation – have reportedly been positioned on administrative go away.
While it has been reported that Epstein’s attorneys pushed to have him faraway from suicide watch, Fernich appeared to know little in regards to the circumstances surrounding the matter, saying solely that it’s “the job of administration and the medical workers in jail, usually” to resolve when a prisoner must be eliminated.
Fernich himself is “skeptical” in regards to the medical expert’s conclusion that Epstein dedicated suicide. “It wouldn’t shock me… to study of something that may have occurred to Jeffrey Epstein,” he says, including that Epstein’s mysterious death will be the topic of conspiracy theories for a long time to come back – with good motive.