section_path: Video recordings
section_name: Video recordings
paragraph_text: Video recordings
  
  Epstein installed concealed cameras in numerous places on his properties to allegedly record sexual activity with underage girls or prominent people for criminal purposes such as blackmail. Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's long-term girlfriend and companion, told a friend that Epstein's private island in the Virgin Islands was completely wired for video and the friend believed that Maxwell and Epstein were videotaping everyone on the island as an insurance policy. When police raided his Palm Beach residence in 2006, two hidden cameras were discovered in his home. It was also reported that Epstein's mansion in New York was wired extensively with a video surveillance system.
  
  Maria Farmer, an artist who worked for Epstein in 1996, noted that Epstein showed her a media room in the New York mansion where there were individuals monitoring the pinhole cameras throughout the house. The media room was accessed through a hidden door. She stated that in the media room "there were men sitting here. And I looked on the cameras, and I saw toilet, toilet, bed, bed, toilet, bed." She added that "It was very obvious that they were, like, monitoring private moments."
  
  Epstein allegedly "lent" girls to powerful people to ingratiate himself with them and also to gain possible blackmail information. According to the Department of Justice, he kept compact discs locked in his safe in his New York mansion with handwritten labels that included the description: "young + ". Epstein implied that he had blackmail material when he told a New York Times reporter in 2018, off the record, that he had dirt on powerful people, including information about their sexual proclivities and recreational drug use.
  
  In May 2025, the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced plans to release surveillance footage from the night of Jeffrey Epstein's death, aiming to address ongoing conspiracy theories. Deputy Director Dan Bongino stated that the video clearly shows Epstein alone in his cell, with no evidence of outside involvement, reaffirming the official ruling of suicide.
  
  Epstein installed concealed cameras in numerous places on his properties to allegedly record sexual activity with underage girls or prominent people for criminal purposes such as blackmail. Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's long-term girlfriend and companion, told a friend that Epstein's private island in the Virgin Islands was completely wired for video and the friend believed that Maxwell and Epstein were videotaping everyone on the island as an insurance policy. When police raided his Palm Beach residence in 2006, two hidden cameras were discovered in his home. It was also reported that Epstein's mansion in New York was wired extensively with a video surveillance system.
  
  Maria Farmer, an artist who worked for Epstein in 1996, noted that Epstein showed her a media room in the New York mansion where there were individuals monitoring the pinhole cameras throughout the house. The media room was accessed through a hidden door. She stated that in the media room "there were men sitting here. And I looked on the cameras, and I saw toilet, toilet, bed, bed, toilet, bed." She added that "It was very obvious that they were, like, monitoring private moments."
  
  Epstein allegedly "lent" girls to powerful people to ingratiate himself with them and also to gain possible blackmail information. According to the Department of Justice, he kept compact discs locked in his safe in his New York mansion with handwritten labels that included the description: "young + ". Epstein implied that he had blackmail material when he told a New York Times reporter in 2018, off the record, that he had dirt on powerful people, including information about their sexual proclivities and recreational drug use.
  
  In May 2025, the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced plans to release surveillance footage from the night of Jeffrey Epstein's death, aiming to address ongoing conspiracy theories. Deputy Director Dan Bongino stated that the video clearly shows Epstein alone in his cell, with no evidence of outside involvement, reaffirming the official ruling of suicide.