The two Bureau of Prisons workers shockingly admitted that they falsified records the night Jeffrey Epstein killed himself in a New York jail and according to them they will skirt any time behind bars under a deal with federal prosecutors.
Authorities released a statement on Friday that Tova Noel and Michael Thomas struck a deferred prosecution agreement with prosecutors after being charged with lying on prison records.
In exchange for admitting they’d falsified records, Thomas and Noel agreed to complete 100 hours of community service and cooperate with a DOJ investigation into the matter — but they’ll avoid jail time.
The deal still needs to be approved by a federal judge.
Forbes has reached out to Thomas’ and Noel’s lawyers for comment.
Prosecutors alleged that Noel and Thomas sat at their desks just 15 feet from Epstein’s cell, shopped online for furniture and motorcycles, and walked around the unit’s common area instead of making required rounds every 30 minutes.
During one two-hour period, both appeared to have been asleep, according to the indictment filed against them.
Epstein’s death was a major embarrassment for the federal Bureau of Prisons and highlighted major security and staffing issues within the agency. It revealed the jail was suffering from problems including chronic staffing shortages that lead to mandatory overtime for guards day after day and other staff being pressed into service as correctional officers.
The bizarre circumstances surrounding his suicide have led to a plethora of conspiracy theories. Even Epstein’s brother Mark Epstein has said publicly that he doesn’t believe the official suicide story.
“Jeffrey knew a lot of stuff about a lot of people,” he said.
Very soon after the death of Epstein, former President Donald Trump retweeted a claim that Hillary Clinton had the child molester murdered to protect her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
Epstein died in jail in August 2019 while awaiting trial for sex trafficking of underage girls, and his death was ruled a suicide. The incident raised immediate questions about why such a high-profile detainee was able to kill himself in the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ custody. Federal prosecutors later accused Noel and Thomas, who sat 15 feet away from Epstein’s cell the night of his death, of napping and shopping online rather than conducting checks every half-hour, and filling out false reports to make it look like they’d done their job. Epstein was on 24-hour suicide watch weeks before his death but was later taken off watch.
His death brought attention to apparent staffing problems plaguing the federal jail. One guard assigned to Epstein’s unit had reportedly worked five consecutive days of overtime.
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