Texas Dem Boasts On Video He Got Bandmate With Lengthy Criminal Rap Sheet ‘Out Of Jail’
'He can do anything with the accordion'
Republicans Launch Bills To Stop Child Predators And Foreigners From Buying Children
A new pair of bills seeks to close the loopholes that enable the surrogacy industry and its abuse of both children and immigration laws.Democratic Virginia AG to take over case against trans-identifying sex offender accused of exposing himself at school
Jay Jones, the radical Democratic attorney general of Virginia, will take over the case against a registered, repeat sex offender accused of exposing himself to girls and women in a school locker room.
Richard Kenneth Cox, 59, was initially registered as a sex offender in 1998 after he was convicted of taking indecent liberties with a child. The Tier III sex offender was convicted of possessing obscene material with a minor in 2007. Cox was also convicted for failing to register as a sex offender, once in 2007 and again in 2021.
'The statute is therefore void for vagueness.'
Cox admitted in a letter written to a judge in 1992 that he had “sexual problems.” A few years later, in a separate letter, he stated that he was aware that he experienced “compulsions to expose myself in public places,” WJLA previously reported.
He is facing over 20 charges related to allegations that he exposed his naked body in a female locker room at a Washington-Liberty High School pool on Oct. 21, 2024. The charges include indecent exposure, sex offender on school or day-care property, and sex offender loitering near school/day care/park/playground.
Outside of regular school hours, the Washington-Liberty High School pool is open to the public.
Cox, who goes by the name Riki Cox, has claimed to identify as a female. The school district's policy allows individuals to use the locker room that they believe aligns with their so-called gender identity.
“My civil rights as a transgender person allow me to use a public facility, including restrooms and changing rooms that identify as my gender,” Cox told law enforcement authorities in Nov. 2024.
On March 12, Arlington County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Lopez granted Cox’s request to dismiss his case. The judge agreed with Cox’s claim that the Virginia law under which he was charged is vague under the 14th Amendment.
The judge was referring to Virginia Code § 18.2-370.2(B), which states, “Every adult who is convicted of an offense prohibiting proximity to children when the offense occurred on or after July 1, 2000, shall as part of his sentence be forever prohibited from loitering within 100 feet of the premises of any place he knows or has reason to know is a primary, secondary or high school.”
Lopez concluded that “loitering” was not clearly defined and that the statute lacks standards to guide enforcement.
“The statute is therefore void for vagueness,” Lopez wrote.
RELATED: 2 boys were filmed by a girl in the boys' school locker room. The school punished the BOYS.
Arlington Commonwealth’s Attorney Parisa Dehghani-Tafti’s office appealed the judge’s decision, and the Court of Appeals accepted the case. Now, AG Jones, who previously fantasized about the death of a Republican and his children, will represent the commonwealth in the case.
Separately, Cox was convicted in February for possessing child pornography, which police said they found on his phone and on a memory device when he was arrested in Dec. 2024 for charges related to the exposure case.
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VIDEO: 'Heroic' teen girl fights off sex predator just after he used twisted ruse in assault of 66-year-old woman, police say
A Michigan man was caught on video attacking and attempting to kidnap a 14-year-old girl last month, and the Kentwood Police Department said in a statement that it wasn't the only assault he allegedly committed that day.
"A 66-year-old female reported that while working in her yard between 5 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. on May 12, 2026, a male suspect stopped his vehicle, engaged her in conversation, made unwanted advances, and physically assaulted her," police said.
'I think he chose me because he saw me as a woman alone.'
Mary Raab, the first alleged victim, told WOOD-TV she was planting flowers by her mailbox when a man approached and told her that he was struggling because his brother had died.
"He got out and said, 'I have had this very traumatic incident happen to me, my brother passed away, and I am in deep grief, and I do not know how to deal with it,'" Raab said.
Raab added, "I am thinking, 'Well, this is very weird.'"
Raab said the man then asked her if he could use her restroom and wash his hands. Raab said she declined and directed him to a local gas station.
"I went to shake his hand, and then he put his arms around me and went to kiss me on the mouth, and I turned my head away, and he planted his lips between my jawbone and my neck," Raab said.
She continued, "He made it kind of difficult to break out of his embrace."
Raab added, "It is violating somebody’s space; why do you think you have the right to do that?"
"I think he chose me because he saw me as a woman alone. He was definitely testing me to see how vulnerable I was, and luckily I was calm enough and level-headed enough to make him go away without having anything devastating and dramatic happen," Raab said.
At around 6:40 p.m., police officers responded to a report of an attempted kidnapping.
Video appears to show a dark-colored SUV pulling up alongside a teen before a man jumps out of the vehicle, runs toward her, and assaults her.
"A 14-year-old female reported that the suspect stopped his vehicle, approached her, physically assaulted her, and attempted to restrain her while she was walking on the sidewalk," the statement read.
Police said the victim was able to fight off the suspect, who fled the crime scene in his vehicle.
Court records obtained by WWMT-TV noted that the girl told investigators the suspect grabbed her and told her, "I got you," before she fought him off.
Police described the teen's acts as "heroic."
"That victim absolutely saved her own life that day; she did amazing things and fought hard and made that suspect jump back in the car and take off," Kentwood Police Department Captain Tim Wierenga told WOOD.
Investigators interviewed witnesses, utilized license plate information, and obtained surveillance video from a resident. Detectives determined that the same suspect committed the assault and attempted kidnapping.
Police identified the suspect as 29-year-old John Moore and arrested him within 24 hours of the alleged crimes.
Records from the Kent County Correctional Facility show that Moore was arrested and booked on May 13. Moore is being held on $140,000 bail.
Moore was charged with unlawful imprisonment and assault and battery.
Citing records from the Kent County Sheriff’s Office, the New York Post reported that Moore also was hit with two probation violations.
"Obviously age didn’t matter to him; he was just looking for a victim," Raab said. "But I am glad that I kept my head. I am glad I didn’t let him into my house."
WOOD reported that Moore had been previously arrested for being a "bathroom peeper who recorded an upskirt video" at a grocery store in September 2023.
WOOD at the time reported that a woman was in a restroom stall of the store when she noticed Moore "peering down at her from the next stall over."
Surveillance cameras also caught Moore recording an upskirt video in the store’s common area and "crouching down behind the victim" to position his cell phone to record up the shopper's dress, according to WOOD.
In 2025, Moore allegedly sexually assaulted women at a different grocery store.
Kent County Prosecutor Chris Becker told WOOD that Moore walked around the store telling female customers they had spiders on their backs and then grabbed their buttocks.
Three women reported that Moore assaulted them, Becker said.
Moore was sentenced to time served; he had already spent six months in jail. Moore also was given three years of probation and ordered to register as a sex offender.
Moore's public defender at a hearing called him "kind" and "gentle," WOOD reported.
"He's kind, and he’s gentle, and he’s patient," attorney Laura Joyce said of Moore. "And I don’t think these crimes are reflective of the person that he is."
"I think that he’s had a reckoning while he’s been in jail regarding some potential substance abuse issues that he has to handle," Joyce added.
Those who witnessed suspicious activity related to the case or the suspect are urged to contact the Kentwood Police Department at 616-656-6580 or send an anonymous tip through Silent Observer at 616-774-2345.
The Kentwood Police Department did not immediately respond to Blaze News' request for comment.
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Bill Gates' world continues to unravel with Epstein probe, foundation layoffs
The Epstein files may have largely disappeared from the 24-hour news cycle on this side of the Atlantic, but the damning revelations they contain nevertheless continue to haunt former associates of the dead pedophile, especially Microsoft co-founder and vaccine champion Bill Gates.
While maintaining that he "did nothing illicit," Gates reportedly apologized to staff of the Gates Foundation at a town hall in February, acknowledging the negative impact that his ties — developed after Epstein's conviction in 2008 for soliciting sex from minor girls — have had on the organization and stressing that it was a "huge mistake to spend time with Epstein."
"Our work is very reputational sensitive," said the billionaire. "I mean, people can choose to work with us or not work with us."
'He is looking forward to answering all the committee’s questions.'
It appears the scandal-stunted organization has itself chosen to work with fewer people.
According to an internal email reviewed by the Wall Street Journal, the Gates Foundation is poised to cut about 500 jobs, or about 20% of its staff, by 2030. The foundation reportedly plans to reduce its current headcount of 2,375 by 200 by the end of next year.
"This is a challenging time for our organization in many ways, but it also highlights the critical importance of taking the tough actions now," Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman reportedly said in the letter.
RELATED: Epstein kept a detailed Google Calendar — and you can read all of his appointments
The foundation teased these layoffs earlier this year in a release detailing how the organization was planning to cap annual operating expenditures at $1.25 billion, roughly 14% of the foundation's total budget.
In addition to slimming down, the Gates Foundation — which is set to shutter in December 2045 — is presently undergoing a desperate PR rehab.
The organization announced on Tuesday that it has "commissioned an external review to assess past foundation engagement with Epstein, and our current policies for vetting and developing new philanthropic partnerships."
The foundation noted further that this review is underway and an update is expected this summer.
In addition to facing scrutiny from investigators tasked by his own organization, Gates is scheduled to appear before the House Oversight Committee for a transcribed interview on June 10.
Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) noted in a March 3 letter to Gates that the committee is reviewing:
the alleged mismanagement of the federal government’s investigation into Mr. Jeffrey Epstein and Ms. Ghislaine Maxwell, (ii) the circumstances and subsequent investigations of Mr. Epstein's death, (iii) the operation of sex-trafficking rings and ways for the federal government to effectively combat them, (iv) ways in which Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell sought to curry favor and exercise influence to protect their illegal activities, and (v) potential violations of ethics rules related to elected officials.
Comer said that the committee suspects Gates has information that will help with this investigation.
A spokesman for Gates told Politico, "While he never witnessed or participated in any of Epstein’s illegal conduct, he is looking forward to answering all the committee’s questions to support their important work."
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'The mistake I made': Bill Gates reportedly admits to affairs with Russians, apologizes for Epstein fallout
The Epstein files released by the Department of Justice last month painted Microsoft co-founder and vaccine champion Bill Gates in a particularly unfavorable light.
Amid uproar over her ex-husband's repeat mention in the files — including in a 2013 email wherein Jeffrey Epstein alleged that he procured for Bill Gates "drugs, in order to deal with consequences of sex with Russian girls" — Melinda French Gates told NPR's "Wild Card" podcast, "It's personally hard whenever those details come up, right? Because it brings back memories of some very, very painful times in my marriage."
'Knowing what I know now makes it, you know, a hundred times worse.'
While French Gates indicated that she has "been able to move on in life," her ex-husband is alternatively still dealing with the consequences of his long-standing association with the notorious child sex offender.
Gates reportedly apologized to the staff of the Gates Foundation for the fallout of his Epstein ties during a town hall on Tuesday, stating, "It was a huge mistake to spend time with Epstein," according to a recording reviewed by the Wall Street Journal.
Gates, who has not been accused of wrongdoing by any of Epstein's victims and whose spokesperson characterized the claims in the 2013 email as "completely false," reportedly stressed, "I did nothing illicit. I saw nothing illicit."
The billionaire reportedly had an explanation for the photographs in the files featuring him in the company of women whose faces are redacted. Epstein asked to take pictures of his assistants with Gates after meetings, Gates claimed, according to the Journal.
RELATED: Epstein-friendly lesbians managing fraud-plagued Manhattan club in hot water — again
"To be clear, I never spent any time with the victims, the women around him," said Gates, according to the Journal. He noted, however, that he "did have affairs, one with a Russian bridge player who met me at bridge events, and one with a Russian nuclear physicist who I met through business activities."
Gates reportedly suggested further that despite his ex-wife expressing concerns about Epstein in 2013 — five years after he pleaded guilty to solicitation of a minor for prostitution — Gates continued meeting with Epstein.
"Knowing what I know now makes it, you know, a hundred times worse in terms of not only his crimes in the past, but now it’s clear there was ongoing bad behavior," Gates reportedly told staff.
Gates, apparently recognizing that his relationship with Epstein helped boost Epstein's reputation, reportedly apologized "to other people who are drawn into this because of the mistake I made."
Gates also recognized the negative impact his Epstein ties have had on the organization previously known as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which became the Gates Foundation last year following the couple's divorce and previous revelations about Bill's ties to Epstein.
"It definitely is the opposite of the values of the Foundation and the goals of the Foundation," said Gates, who has directly and through his foundation worked to shape public health, the news landscape, education policy, AI, American farmland, the energy sector, foreign policy, and the Earth itself.
"And our work is very reputational sensitive," continued the billionaire. "I mean, people can choose to work with us or not work with us."
When asked about the recording and Gates' remarks, the Gates Foundation told Blaze News in a statement, "This was a scheduled townhall with employees, which Bill does twice a year. In the conversation, Bill answered questions submitted by foundation staff on a range of issues, including the release of the Epstein files, the foundation's work in AI, and the future of global health."
The foundation added, "In the townhall, Bill spoke candidly, addressing several questions in detail, and took responsibility for his actions."
"The harm Epstein inflicted on women and girls was horrific, and no one should ever have to experience what they did," the foundation said in a statement earlier this month. "The foundation regrets having any employees interact with Epstein in any way."
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!Do the Epstein files confirm this Pizzagate theory? NY Mag contributor makes stunning admission.
WikiLeaks published tens of thousands of leaked emails from the personal account of John Podesta, former President Bill Clinton's chief of staff, in late 2016.
The decentralized army of sleuths that subsequently combed over the leaked emails found not only damning insights into Hillary Clinton and her doomed presidential campaign but odd messages about pizza, hot dogs, ice cream, and other foods.
'842 occurrences of the word pizza, which seems like a lot.'
The recurring references to food in non-culinary contexts prompted some to theorize that they were code words related to pedophilia and human trafficking — a theory that the mainstream media and so-called fact-checkers emphasized was "dangerous," "fake news," and, in essence, a "moral panic."
New York Magazine, one of the publications that strenuously criticized the so-called Pizzagate theory nine years ago, suggested in the wake of the new Jeffrey Epstein documents' release that "pizza" might be a code word, after all.
Dan Brooks, writing for New York Magazine, noted that the latest trove of Epstein files published by the Department of Justice "contains 842 occurrences of the word pizza, which seems like a lot. By comparison, the word hamburger appears only 190 times, while the phrase 'sex with children' appears 20 times."
Brooks admitted that "some of the pizza-related material seems pretty weird."
RELATED: Gov. Pritzker's cousin steps down at Hyatt over Epstein relationship
Not only did Epstein appear to have automated alerts reminding him to deliver a certain individual pizza, but he was asked on more than one occasion if individuals could have a "quick pizza" together in his absence.
One email said, "I wanted to let you know that the crew really enjoyed the pizza today. Thank you for letting us do that."
Another message from a redacted sender stated, “This is better than a Chinese cookie! Let's go for pizza and grape soda again. No one else can understand."
Additional emails carry subject lines such as “The Pizza Monster!” and include more peculiar uses of the word.
“You mean radiating a soft glow with the look of bliss and excitement. Yeah, that's the pizza...” one message reads.
"These recent Epstein materials do make the financier seem strangely interested in pizza and unusually committed to having it delivered to other people," added Brooks.
There are also recurring references to "pizza and grape soda" in the child sex offender's texts and emails.
Despite the strangeness of the exchanges, a photograph in a text conversation between Epstein and his urologist appears to indicate that on at least one occasion, they were actually discussing pizza and grape soda.
While there has been plenty of speculation in recent weeks about the pizza references, particularly because they appear in both the Epstein and Podesta files, the term "cream cheese," which appears 196 times throughout the Epstein messages, has also raised eyebrows.
In one exchange, a participant wrote, "Lol, I don’t know if cream cheese and baby are on the same level," alongside discussions of scheduling activities that some observers say raise further concern. The phrase also appears in other unsettling contexts, including "cream cheese baby."
The use of cheese and pizza imagery in reference to pedophilia and child abuse is not limited to so-called Pizzagate conspiracy theorists.
In 2020, the Telegraph, a U.K.-based newspaper, reported that a parents' group working to curb the dissemination of child sex abuse material online allegedly found that cheese and pizza emojis were being used as stand-ins for "CP," meaning "child porn."
The founder of the group, a London woman identified only as India, indicated that in some cases, individuals using the emojis shared images of children scraped from parents' social media accounts.
"There are pictures of little boys aged 5 or 6 on the beach in their swimming trunks and chances are that picture was taken by their parents on their holiday," said India. "Somehow that picture has gotten into their hands."
Brooks, prickled by recent declarations by Redditors and others that at least one core Pizzagate claim might have been accurate all along, stated, "If Epstein and his friends did use pizza as a code word for sex, that wouldn’t mean that the original Pizzagate conspiracy theory was correct — even if it was also the case that pizza was a sexual code word in the Podesta emails."
After spending the bulk of his article entertaining the possibility that "a syndicate of pedophiliac celebrities, financiers, and their urologists," equipped with code words, committed "unimaginable acts of cruelty," Brooks spends his final paragraphs attacking those who made similar claims nearly a decade ago.
The NY Mag contributor suggested that such "conspiracists" — not the allegedly vampiric cosmopolitan elites who might refer to their preferred victim types with fast-food references — are "one of the most terrifying forces in 21st-century America."
Having turned his ire away from the dead pedophile and his associates to those Americans searching for justice and accountability, Brooks concluded his article by smearing American democracy as a "well-documented conspiracy of morons."
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'Smoking Gun': Yale prof nearly blown up by Unabomber defends his Epstein emails
David Gelernter, a professor of computer science at Yale University and chief scientist at Mirror Worlds Technologies, survived an explosive letter he received in 1993 from Theodore "Ted" Kaczynski, the domestic terrorist known as the Unabomber.
It appears, however, that his reputation has taken a hit over letters he sent years later to Jeffrey Epstein — especially since he has emphasized he regrets "nothing" about his relationship with the child sex offender.
The package
Kaczynski targeted businessmen, scholars, and random civilians with homemade bombs from 1978 to 1995, injuring over 22 victims and ultimately killing three people. Among the Unabomber's victims was Gelernter.
'Gentlemen and ladies don't read each other's mail.'
On the morning of June 24, 1993, the Yale professor — who had just returned from a vacation in the national capital — sat down in his office in Arthur K. Watson Hall to catch up on his mail. Along with various envelopes, waiting for him was a package, which he reportedly thought was a Ph.D. dissertation.
Gelernter recalled that when he tore it open, he was greeted by smoke, a hiss, and a flash. Shocked, missing a few fingers, and under the impression that multiple bombs "must be going off all over campus," the professor fled the building, bleeding profusely.
"I saw the bones sticking out in all directions and the skin crumpled like paper," he later wrote.
According to the Yale Daily News, the computer professor suffered severe wounds to "his abdomen, chest, face and hand, and even today Gelernter does not have the use of his right hand."
The Unabomber later sent the professor a letter in April 1995 providing some insight into his animus toward technologists, writing, "People with advanced degrees aren't as smart as they think they are. If you'd had any brains you would have realized that there are a lot of people out there who resent bitterly the way techno-nerds like you are changing the world."
RELATED: Dear Uncle Ted
The threatening letters sent his way by the terrorist helped boost Gelernter's profile. The letters Gelernter later sent to Epstein now threaten to tear it down.
The letters
David Gelernter's name repeatedly shows up in the Epstein files released on Jan. 30 by the Department of Justice, specifically in emails sent from 2009 to 2015.
Blaze News has reached out to Gelernter for comment.
'I have no idea who my successor will be.'
Some of Gelernter's letters to and from Epstein — exchanged years after Epstein pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution — discuss meetups, a visit to Yale, architecture, business opportunities, and art shows.
The author of an especially questionable letter dated Oct. 11, 2011, and signed "David" — a letter Gelernter has reportedly defended writing — told Epstein about a female student he was recommending for a job in 2011, describing her as a "Yale sr, worked at Vogue last summ=r [sic], runs her own campus mag, art major, completely connected, v small goodl=oking [sic] blonde."
Yale spokeswoman Karen Peart told CT Insider in an email last week that "the university does not condone the language used by the professor or the conduct he describes in his emails."
Gelernter told the CT Insider that at the time of writing, he had no idea about Epstein's status as a sex offender, that he was never exposed to Epstein's sex trafficking operation, and that he only became aware of the sex offender's criminal history around five years ago.
"From my standpoint, he was one of the two (maybe three) smartest men I'd ever met," Gelernter told the publication. "He was fun to talk to."
"Fondness for little girls is a perversion that runs way outside ordinary locker-room talk," the professor noted further. "No one would ever introduce it into normal conversation."
The professor subsequently stated in a Feb. 4, 2026, letter to Yale's engineering school Dean Jeffrey Brock that was forwarded to the Yale Daily News, "I was recommending her for a job I thought she'd like. When you do that — when you actually care about a rec letter — you keep the potential boss's habits in mind."
"So long as I said nothing that dishonored her in any conceivable way, I'd have told him more or less what he wanted. She was smart, charming & gorgeous. Ought I to have suppressed that info? Never!" continued Gelernter. "I'm very glad I wrote the note."
When asked the next day whether he regretted any part of his relationship with Epstein, Gelernter told the Yale Daily News, "Nothing."
Gelernter's latest statements defending his correspondence with Epstein have apparently already led to consequences.
In a message to his students obtained by the CT Insider, Gelernter reportedly indicated that he had been removed from the class.
"For now on I no longer teach CPSC 4500. I have no idea who my successor will be," wrote the professor, who has tenure at the university.
In his letter to students, Gelernter again defended his October 2011 letter to Epstein, claiming that the student referred to wanted to be recommended for a job working on the financial side of Epstein's private bank; stating that neither he nor the student were aware that Epstein was a sex trafficker; and condemning the university for taking issue with a personal email.
"The university's Smoking Gun is a personal, private email, dug out of the dump of Epstein files. (If someone handed you a a stack of other people's private correspondence, would you dive in and read them? Of course not. Gentlemen and ladies don't read each other's mail. (Courtesy 101.)," wrote Gelernter.
According to ratings from students on Yale's internal professor evaluation system, Gelernter reportedly ranked dead last among the 82 professors who have taught computer science courses at the university since 2020 and in the bottom 2% of all professors across the university.
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Trump makes big appearance in Epstein files — just not the way Democrats may have hoped
When it became clear in December that the complete release of the Jeffrey Epstein files would be delayed, various Democrats suggested that President Donald Trump might be trying to conceal damning and previously unknown details about his relationship with the child sex offender.
For example, Sen. Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), a recipient of contributions from Epstein, suggested that "this is nothing more than a cover-up to protect Donald Trump from his ugly past."
Unfortunately for Schumer and other Democrats apparently desperate for dirt on the president, one of the newly released files reveals that Trump was anything but an ally to Epstein — that he reportedly thanked law enforcement for going after the pervert and stressed the importance of also focusing on Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's former lover and co-conspirator.
'She is evil.'
A document dated April 23, 2020, details an interview conducted by FBI agents the previous year with a law enforcement official regarding his department's investigation into Epstein in the 2000s and his personal conversation on the topic at the time with Trump.
Although his name is redacted, the document appears to indicate that the interviewee became chief of the Palm Beach Police Department in 2001.
Michael Reiter — the man who served as chief of the PBPD from 2001 to 2009 and launched the first investigation into Epstein — confirmed to the Miami Herald that he was interviewed by FBI agents in 2019 and spoke with Trump in July 2006.
According to the FBI's 302 summary of its interview, the interviewee told the feds that "TRUMP was one of the very first people to call when people found out that they were investigating EPSTEIN."
In addition to noting that he kicked Epstein out of Mar-a-Lago and that people in New York knew Epstein was disgusting, Trump told the chief that he was "around EPSTEIN once when teenagers were present and ... 'got the hell out of there.'"
Trump expressed gratitude to the interviewee for doing something about the sex offender, stating, "Thank goodness you're stopping him; everyone has known he’s been doing this," the FBI said in the 302 document.
Trump also mentioned Epstein's "operative" Ghislaine Maxwell in his conversation with the chief, noting that "she is evil and to focus on her," said the document.
Maxwell, 64, was sentenced in 2022 to 20 years in prison for her role in a scheme to sexually exploit and abuse minor girls as young as 14 with Epstein, going all the way back to the early 1990s.
An FBI official told the Herald, "We are not aware of any corroborating evidence that the president contacted law enforcement 20 years ago."
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) said in response to the newly released document, "Trump didn't play their game, he helped expose it. And when they couldn't blackmail him they tried to smear him."
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Why are so many people all of a sudden saying Epstein is alive?
The Department of Justice's publication last month of over 3 million additional pages, 2,000 videos, and 180,000 images from the Jeffrey Epstein files provided the public with new insights into the child sex offender, his degeneracy, his business dealings, and his international network of affluent friends.
The files, which are replete with odd and in many cases damning communications — already triggering at least one criminal investigation in the United Kingdom — have prompted renewed interest in a number of theories about Epstein.
While many sleuths poring over the files have zeroed in on references to cannibalism and accusations of Epstein and his inner circle allegedly engaging in "ritualistic sacrifice," others appear more focused on what the files have to say about the sex offender's reported death at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City.
Citing discrepancies in the official narrative, admissions about falsified records, and viral claims on social media, skeptics have long theorized that Epstein did not kill himself but was murdered or possibly even secreted away in August 2019.
Despite the newly available autopsy photos and details, these theories are enjoying a second life due in part to certain details in the new files, a viral image of a bearded look-alike, and signs of activity on a video game account name associated with the sex offender.
Epstein in Tel Aviv
An image went viral earlier this month purportedly showing a bearded Jeffrey Epstein alive and well in Israel. On closer examination, however, the image — which was popularized in part by a self-described "unapologetic Muslim Palestinian" and by a Middle Eastern-based news account — showed signs of AI manipulation and/or generation.
For starters, the wording on the street signs is reportedly "gibberish," providing not only incorrect Hebrew and Arabic lettering but in one case referencing a road that doesn't appear to exist.
The supposed photograph of Epstein in Tel Aviv also appears to be a cropped version of an image that appeared days earlier bearing a Gemini AI watermark on the subreddit r/hardaiimages — a destination for AI-generated images designed to give viewers pause.
The pre-emptive death notice
In line with the official narrative, the newly released FBI New York Field Office report regarding Epstein's death — which includes images of paramedics apparently attempting to revive the sex offender, an image of his corpse without his arm tattoo visible, images of his broken hyoid bone and breaks in his thyroid cartilage, and images of his apparent scene of death — asserts that Epstein was found unresponsive and died as the result of an apparent suicide on the morning of Aug. 10, 2019.
However, one of the other newly released files suggested that Epstein died a day earlier.
In the document, which is dated Aug. 9, 2019, then-U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Geoffrey Berman stated, "Earlier this morning, the Manhattan Correctional Center confirmed that Jeffrey Epstein, who faced charges brought by this Office of engaging in the sex trafficking of minors, had been found unresponsive in his cell and pronounced dead shortly thereafter."
'Someone's been having fun renaming their Fortnite account.'
"Today's events are disturbing, and we are deeply aware of their potential to present yet another hurdle to giving Epstein's many victims their day in Court," Berman added.
The date on the release as it appears now with an "updated" note on the Justice Department website is Aug. 10, 2019.
The DOJ did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.
While the incorrect date might simply be a typo in a draft release, many online have speculated it is an indication of foreknowledge of Epstein's real or faked death.
Gaming from beyond the grave
Some sleuths who dug into the new trove of Epstein files found mention of the child sex offender's YouTube username, "littlestjeff1." They also found possible evidence that Epstein was active in the video gaming ecosystem after his permanent ban from Xbox live in the form of a May 7, 2019, email highlighting a $25.95 charge for the virtual currency in the game Fortnite.
In a massively viral and widely shared tweet, the X user @Truthpole noted that some individuals "matched this exact username to a Fortnite profile on Fortnite Tracker ... which showed stats like Silver 1 rank in Chapter 5 Season 1 (post-2019), wins into 2025, and past activity flagged in Israel."
The suggestion that Epstein may have been active on Fortnite after his supposed death was not only advanced in viral posts by other accounts on X but on other social media platforms, including Instagram.
The claim was all the more provocative after littlestjeff1's stats were set to private earlier this month, according to archived page captures highlighted by Snopes.
Tim Sweeney, the CEO of Fornite's developer and publisher Epic Games, weighed in on Feb. 6 to pour cold water on this particular theory, writing, "Someone's been having fun renaming their Fortnite account, but it's recent and not connected to the email addresses in the archive."
The official Fortnite Status account similarly piped up, stating, "This was a ruse by a Fortnite player."
"A few days ago, an existing Fortnite account owner changed their username from something totally unrelated to littlestjeff1, following the revelation of littlestjeff1 as a name on YouTube," the official Fortnite account said. "These Fortnite trackers only display your current name, not any prior changes to it."
The Fortnite Status account noted further, "We have no record of the subject's email addresses referenced in the public document existing in the Epic account system. Since the public document releases, people have created Fortnite accounts with similar-looking email addresses and user names."
When challenged on this explanation and prompted to account for why the apparent Epstein handle appeared to be associated with the game user in a third-party, year-end recap detailing player results in 2025, Fornite Status noted, "Fortnite gg Wrapped shows the account's current name with stats from 2025."
Skepticism still abounds about the explanation from Epic Games, given the mention of the digital Fortnite currency purchase in the Epstein emails; however, in that email, both the sender and the recipient's addresses were redacted. Snopes suggested that other correspondences in the files indicate the game currency purchase pertained to a mother and her child.
Besides eyebrow-raising video game activity, fake sightings, and a questionable DOJ memo, skeptics have also raised questions about other findings in the files, including the mention in an FBI memorandum of a "flash of orange" spotted on surveillance footage heading toward the isolated prison tier where Epstein was housed the night before his body was reportedly found.
A 2023 report on Epstein's death released by the Department of Justice's Office of the Inspector General identified the "orange shape" as a corrections officer carrying linen or inmate clothing.
Video forensic experts expressed to CBS News in August that they were "skeptical about that interpretation and suggested that the shape could be a person dressed in an orange prison jumpsuit climbing the stairs."
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