Did Federal Prosecutors Suborn Perjury?
Jeffrey Epstein's cellmate claims that they wanted him to incriminate Trump and the facts be damned.
Yesterday (August 16) Jessica Reed Kraus posted an article and an audio file on
that provides a window into the government’s lawfare against President Trump.A link to Jessica’s article is here. A link to the audio is near the bottom of her post.
The audio file is a recording of a June 6 telephonic interview that Jessica did with Nick Tartaglione, Jeffrey Epstein’s former cellmate in the Brooklyn Metropolitan Detention Center. Tartaglione was recounting some of his conversations with Epstein.
As Tartaglione tells it, Epstein returned to their shared cell after a meeting with the federal prosecutors. He told his cellmate that the prosecutors were fishing for a plea deal with him if he would provide damaging information about Trump that would support his impeachment. It didn’t matter whether it was true or not.
Tartaglione asked whether Epstein knew Trump. Epstein acknowledged that although he did know Trump, they didn’t like each other. When Tartaglione asked why, Epstein described how Trump had kicked him out of Mar-a-Lago because he, Epstein, was there with an under-aged girl. Here is Tartaglione’s description of the conversation:
[Epstein]: They told me they will let me plead out to something small and I will do just a couple of years in a camp if I can give them something on Trump [and] get him impeached. And, uh, I said, ‘Well, do you know Trump?’ He [Epstein] says, ‘I know him, I met him, but we don’t like each other.’ I laughed. I said, ‘Why?”. He said, ‘Trump threw me out of a party at his place in Florida. I said, ‘Why did he throw you out?’ ‘He got mad. I was talking to some girl….’
Epstein went on to tacitly acknowledge that the “some girl” was under-aged. He also told the prosecutors that he could not “give them something on Trump” because he did not know anything that would incriminate Trump. That did not deter them; they pressed on.
Epstein explained how the prosecutors tried to get him to give testimony to support Trump’s impeachment, even if it wasn’t true. Here is Tartaglione’s description of their conversation:
He [Epstein] said, ‘I don’t know anything. . . . But the government told me I don’t have to prove what I say about Trump as long as Trump’s people can’t disprove it.’ I [Tartaglione] said ‘Yes, he’s the President of the United States. His people are the FBI.’ He [Epstein] said, ‘That’s what I said, and they said, no, the FBI’s our people, not his people.’
It is worth noting that Section 1622 of the U.S. Criminal Code (Title 18) provides as follows:
§1622. Subornation of perjury
Whoever procures another to commit any perjury is guilty of subornation of perjury, and shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
There have been no follow up interviews with Tartaglione. Jessica reports that the day after she posted the audio of her interview with him, he was transferred out of the Brooklyn MDC, where he had been for eight years, to an unknown destination, and has not been heard from since:
Update [by Jessica]: Nick was abruptly moved in the middle of the night without warning just one day after I posted his audio here. He was taken from MDC, where he'd been held for 8 years since his arrest, and relocated to an unknown site. As of now, no one has heard from him yet.1
Bravo Blue Note: On June 10, 2024, Tartaglione was sentenced to serve four consecutive life sentences for murder. He vehemently denies his guilt and vows to appeal. Jessica is doing a series that raises questions about his trial and conviction. Her first installment, also published on June 10, is here. Her second installment, posted yesterday (August 16), is linked above. But his conviction, of course, can be considered in assessing his credibility.
If Tartaglione’s account is true, then we can draw the following conclusions:
Epstein told the prosecutors that even though he didn’t like Trump, he had no incriminating information about him.
The prosecutors didn’t care whether Epstein’s testimony was true or not, as long as it incriminated Trump and would support his impeachment.
The FBI wouldn’t look too closely because they were in the prosecution’s pocket and could be counted upon as allies.
Even if Epstein gave testimony that contradicted his protestations to the government that he had nothing on Trump, he would get a sweetheart deal if Trump were convicted.
Tartaglione’s testimony is tainted by his conviction, but it is consistent with the culture of corruption that we have seen on display in the government’s untoward zeal to convict Trump of anything and the FBI’s collusion in that jihad.
Draw your own conclusions.
Jessica’s update is a tad confusing. She says that Tartaglione was moved the night after she posted the audio of his call to her. But the first post of that audio that I can find is her August 16 post, so the timeline doesn’t work. And the subtitle to her August 16 post refers to “Audio 2.” I cannot find “Audio 1,” but it may refer to Jessica’s August 10 post, which quotes from their June 6 telephone conversation but does not attach an audio file. I have asked Jessica for clarification and will post it when she responds.
A mere two years ago I would have shrugged this off as jailhouse BS. But now, who knows? As I've written many times, the only thing more disturbing than Trump are his enemies.