Lost Jeffrey Epstein suicide attempt video is found: Prosecutors
Just days after confirming they were unable to locate surveillance video captured outside Jeffrey Epstein’s jail cell on the night of his first suicide attempt, prosecutors told a federal judge the video was saved, documents show.
"We are very pleased the video was preserved, as we had asked," Bruce Barket, the attorney for Epstein's former cellmate, said early Friday morning. "We look forward to viewing it. "
The video shows the exterior of the Metropolitan Correctional Center, or MCC, jail cell that Epstein shared with Nicholas Tartaglione, a former police officer who will soon face trial for in a quadruple slaying.
Undated photo of former Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., police officer Nick Tartaglione.
Barket had requested the footage two days after the financier's July 23 suicide attempt, but told FOX Business on Thursday: “It’s gone.”
In a letter later that day, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Maurene Comey and Jason Swergold told District Judge Kenneth M. Karas that the July 22 to July 23 footage had been tracked down.
“Earlier today, the government confirmed with MCC staff that the video was preserved by MCC staff upon defense counsel’s request in July 2019, and the government is in the process of obtaining a copy of the video,” the prosecutors wrote in the one-page document.
The topic of the missing recording arose during a Wednesday status conference at a federal court in White Plains, New York.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ON FOX BUSINESS
The Manhattan lockup where Jeffrey Epstein died.
Barket, who has represented Tartaglione for three years, noted that the jail has already cleared his client of wrongdoing in the attempted suicide but called officials’ inability to find the tape “a bit of a problem.”
JEFFREY EPSTEIN'S PRISON GUARDS ARRESTED AMID FUROR OVER HIS SUICIDE
Tartaglione is charged in what authorities described as the “gangland-style” killings of four men from Middletown, N.Y., who disappeared during a cocaine-related quarrel at a bar in nearby Chester.
The footage could be beneficial to the former police officer’s defense, showing moral character, in a possible death-penalty case, the New York Daily News reported.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ON FOX BUSINESS
Epstein, who was reportedly worth more than $550 million, was charged with sex trafficking of minors and conspiracy in July, but the criminal charges against him were dropped after he was found dead on Aug. 10. Epstein made headlines in part because of high-profile acquaintances including President Trump and Britain's Prince Andrew; former President Bill Clinton flew on his private jet.
A New York City medical examiner ruled Epstein had hanged himself, but experts and even elected officials said they still have questions surrounding his death.
'SOMETHING DOESN'T FIT' IN JEFFREY EPSTEIN DEATH: NEW YORK CITY MAYOR
FOX News' Marta Dhanis and the Associated Press contributed to this report.