DeSantis Signs Bill That Authorizes Release of Epstein Documents: 'The Public Deserves to Know Who Participated'
On Thursday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill into law that officially authorizes the release of documents from a 2006 grand jury investigation in Palm Beach County regarding the late Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual assault of underage girls.
“Today I signed HB 117, authorizing the public release of grand jury documents like those in the Jeffrey Epstein case,” DeSantis wrote on the social media platform X. “Nobody should be above the law, regardless of wealth, status, or connections,” he said. “The public deserves to know who participated in Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking operation, and the survivors deserve justice.”
Today I signed HB 117, authorizing the public release of grand jury documents like those in the Jeffrey Epstein case.
Nobody should be above the law, regardless of wealth, status, or connections. The public deserves to know who participated in Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking…
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) February 29, 2024
WPTV reported, “The bill will take effect July 1, although a South Florida circuit judge might release the transcripts sooner as part of a lawsuit filed by the Palm Beach Post.”
DeSantis held a news conference Thursday in Palm Beach, to coincide with the signing of HB 117, during which he stated, “they say that justice delayed is justice denied. And I think in many respects this whole ordeal has proven that to be true.”
He said the lack of access to the grand jury materials led to the investigation being “stymied.” DeSantis added, “There needs to be a mechanism in some of these rare circumstances where people can get the truth and where we can try to pursue justice.”
Governor DeSantis Signs Legislation to Authorize the Release of Jeffrey Epstein Grand Jury Documents https://t.co/u513T4KJtR
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) February 29, 2024
Addressing his audience at the news briefing, DeSantis said, “We are now sitting here, decades later, and you’ve had Epstein and then [Ghislaine] Maxwell is actually in prison in Florida and yet nothing else has ever happened with any of this.”
He continued, “How is that possible given the magnitude of what was going on? And what was going on in Florida was only a fraction of what was happening because you had activities and abuse in New York City, in the Virgin Islands, and this was a massive, massive operation here that was targeting these very, very young girls. And to not have justice on this is something that has been a big black spot on our justice system.”
Before he signed, DeSantis invited two of Epstein’s accusers, Haley Robson and Jena-Lisa Jones, to speak at the podium.
Both women thanked DeSantis.
“I can’t express the gratitude I have for this bill,” said Robson as she looked at DeSantis with tears welling up in her eyes. “I just am trying to put pieces together on the final pieces of this puzzle to help me move on and finally get the peace that I deserve for my life. And I am just so grateful. And I would just really just want to know, why was Jeffrey Epstein given such grace and mercy for his inhumane crimes and why were we so outed in the media and treated so poorly?”
DeSantis invited Jones to speak next. “We have been left in the dark for so long with no answers to what is going on and why things played out the way they did,” said Jones.
DeSantis then invited Robson, Jones and a third person to join him at the table where he signed HB 117 into law.
Epstein, a billionaire U.S. hedge fund manager, was arrested on July 6, 2019 on sex trafficking charges, which included minor girls as young as 14.
Less than one month later, on August 10, he was found hanging dead in his cell at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center while awaiting trial. Epstein was 66.
Although autopsy reports confirmed Epstein died by suicide, there had been much speculation as to whether his death was, in fact, a murder staged as suicide.
The cameras in Epstein’s cell were mysteriously shut off at the time of his death and his cellmate had been transferred out the day before he died.
Epstein, who was on suicide watch, did not receive a new cellmate.
In an interview with American media personality Tucker Carlson, which was released on Jan. 4, Epstein’s brother Mark also questioned whether Jeffrey died by suicide.
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