Jeffrey Epstein made at least three attempts to take his own life before he was found dead in his cell in August 2019, with nooses discovered on multiple occasions and warnings from his cellmate dismissed by guards, according to a bombshell investigation by the New York Times.
The paper’s report, based on interviews with former inmates and prison records, offers the most detailed account yet of events inside the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York in the weeks before Epstein’s death — circumstances that have been the subject of intense public speculation ever since.
At the centre of the account is Nicolas Tartaglione, a former police officer and convicted murderer who briefly shared a cell with Epstein while the financier awaited trial on child sex trafficking charges. Tartaglione told the New York Times that Epstein asked him how to make a noose before a first attempt on 22 July 2019, just 13 days into his custody and the same day a judge denied him bail. He claims to have witnessed two further attempts — in one, Epstein tied a sheet to a grate above his cell window; in another, Tartaglione woke to find Epstein acting “a little suspicious,” before discovering a homemade noose hidden under his mattress. Tartaglione told the Times he reported both incidents but was laughed off by jail guards. Another inmate, Peter Bright, told the paper that Tartaglione had spoken to him about the attempts shortly after Epstein’s death.
Following the 22 July incident, an internal prison memo headed “Possible Suicide Attempt” recorded that an officer had been called to Epstein’s cell at 1.27am. A guard wrote: “Epstein had indicated that his cellmate had attempted to kill him and had been harassing him. I observed inmate Jeffrey Epstein lying in the foetal position on the floor of his cell, wearing a T-shirt and boxers. He was breathing heavily.” Epstein accused Tartaglione of attempting to “extort” and “kill” him, but an internal investigation cleared the ex-cop. Epstein reportedly told prison staff that ongoing harassment was causing him to make the attempts on his own life. He was taken to a special unit and placed on suicide watch.
The New York Times concluded that while procedural failings — including leaving Epstein “alone in his cell in spite of clear guidance to the contrary” and a failure to catalogue evidence from his cell carefully — created the mysteries that have surrounded his death, interviews with those who knew him in custody pointed more strongly towards suicide than any alternative explanation.
The report comes after a court last month released what is said to be Epstein’s suicide note, in which the convicted sex offender appeared to claim investigators had “found nothing” on him and described the circumstances of his prosecution as unfair. The note concluded with the words “NO FUN” and “NOT WORTH IT!!” underlined.
