Women who say they were abused by disgraced financier and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein raise their hands as attorney Bradley Edwards speaks at a news conference outside the U.S. Capitol on September 3, 2025. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON – A second federal judge in New York on Wednesday granted the U.S. Department of Justice’s request to release grand jury records in the case against Jeffrey Epstein, who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting federal trial on sex trafficking charges and whose case records have become a focus of interest for Congress and victims in recent months.
U.S. District Judge Richard Berman has ordered the release of secret grand jury materials in the government’s 2019 sex trafficking case against a hedge fund manager and friend of celebrities and politicians.
Berman ruled the day after a separate federal judge in New York granted the government’s request to unseat grand jury materials in the 2021 federal case against convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell, who worked closely with Epstein to target minors for sex.
Berman wrote the Justice Department’s request under a recent law, dubbed the Epstein Transparency Act by lawmakers, that requires Attorney General Pam Bondi to release case files related to the Epstein investigation by December 19. Congress mostly passed the measure, and President Donald Trump signed it into law in mid-November.
“The bill requires disclosure of Epstein grand jury materials, requiring the disclosure of “all public records, documents, communications and investigative materials.” Berman he wrote. “Everything” is crystal clear and should be given “ordinary, common sense meaning.”
Berman stressed that all identifying information about the victims must be redacted.
The order also came days after a Florida federal judge decided to release secret grand jury materials from the federal investigation into Epstein from 2005 to 2007. Federal investigators reached an agreement with state prosecutors to end the probe after Epstein pleaded guilty to state charges of soliciting a minor for prostitution.
Political pressure
In July, the FBI issued a memo saying the administration would not publicly release any further records of the federal investigation into Epstein. The denial caused an uproar among lawmakers of both parties, including some among Trump voters.
For months, Trump rejected pressure to release Epstein’s files, calling it a “hoax.” Less than two days before Congress, he was scheduled to vote on the president’s bill changed his mind and told his party to support it.
A bipartisan group of senators and House members Bondi pressed in a Dec. 3 letter to let them know what the Justice Department plans to release later this month.
The law has carve-outs allowing the department to withhold information regarding any ongoing investigations.
On November 14, the department announced that the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan would launch a “new investigation” into any connections between Epstein and former President Bill Clinton, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and prominent investor Reid Hoffman.
Bondi said during a Nov. 19 news conference that “information, new information, additional information has emerged.”
A separate bipartisan panel on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform called on the Justice Department to subpoena all records of the Epstein investigation and garden under the shop Clintons and several former attorneys general for interviews.
The Justice Department maintains that Epstein targeted more than 1,000 victims.
