Epstein's money laundering

A federal judge recently unsealed new records from JPMorgan Chase & Co. (“JPMC” or “the bank”) regarding the bank’s handling of Jeffrey Epstein’s accounts. The unsealed records contain evidence that JPMC underreported Epstein’s suspicious transactions to the federal government for nearly two decades. The bank’s conduct should be fully investigated to determine whether this underreporting of Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) was deliberate. The unsealed documents also reveal that Epstein’s accounts were closely supervised by senior JPMC executives reporting directly to CEO Jamie Dimon, including operating committee member Mary Erdoes. JPMC’s internal data shows that between 2002 and 2016, JPMC reported only $4.3 million in transactions from Epstein’s accounts in a handful of SARs. In September 2019, only after Epstein was arrested, JPMC filed far more comprehensive SARS to report an additional 5,000 wire transfers moving $1.3 billion in and out of Epstein’s accounts. In other words, the cumulative dollar value of the suspicious transactions the bank reported after Epstein’s death in federal custody was nearly 300 times greater than the value of the transactions it flagged while he was alive and actively trafficking women and girls. A compliance failure of this scale is alarming. JPMC’s underreporting of SARs impeded law enforcement’s visibility into the financial infrastructure that enabled Epstein’s cross-border sex trafficking organization. It is crucial that Congress and the U.S. Department of Justice investigate

A financial institution is required to file a suspicious activity report no later than 30 calendar days after the date of initial detection of facts that may constitute a basis for filing a suspicious activity report. If no suspect was identified on the date of detection of the incident requiring the filing, a financial institution may delay filing a suspicious activity report for an additional 30 calendar days to identify a suspect. In no case shall reporting be delayed more than 60 calendar days after the date of initial detection of a reportable transaction.

Under the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), financial institutions are required to assist U.S. government agencies in detecting and preventing money laundering, and:

Keep records of cash purchases of negotiable instruments;

File reports of cash transactions exceeding $10,000 (daily aggregate amount); and

Report suspicious activity that might signal criminal activity (e.g., money laundering, tax evasion).