Democrats are getting the hard drives of trafficker Jeffrey Epstein after the bombshell news that the FBI never had them to begin with.
House Oversight and Reform Committee Ranking Member Robert Garcia (D-Cal.) announced on Friday that all of Jeffrey Epstein's private computers and hard drives were "in the possession of Epstein's private investigators and may never have been seen by any law enforcement agency."
"This information, discovered by Oversight Democrats during the deposition of Epstein's personal attorney Darren Indyke, is critical as we continue our search for the truth. Oversight democrats are working to access these hard drives and items and speak directly with the private investigators. We will identify ever co-conspirator who shielded Epstein and hold them accountable," Garcia said.
According to the letter obtained by ABC News and sent to three private investigators, Garcia wrote, "[T]he Committee requests that you make yourself available for a transcribed interview to provide insight into the contents, removal, storage and location of the materials removed from Mr. Epstein's Palm Beach home."
"The Committee also seeks information regarding the reason for the removal of these materials, the potential withholding of these materials from law enforcement and any other information regarding the activities and crimes of Jeffrey Epstein and any of his co-conspirators," Garcia wrote.
Last month, ABC reported that Epstein hid all of the hard drives and computers from investigators when the Palm Beach Police Department raided his home. The PI, Roy Black, a criminal defense lawyer for Epstein, took all of the evidence from the home, which included all of the computers and more than two dozen phone directories and explicit material, the documents released by the DOJ said.
A 2020 investigation by the Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) found that former Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta, who was the top DOJ prosecutor in Miami at the time, agreed to a plea deal before he could obtain the video footage from Epstein's surveillance cameras.
Acosta later told the House in an interview that during his investigation, "no one from the intelligence community reached out to the office about Epstein and that he had no reason to believe Epstein was an asset to a foreign or domestic intelligence agency," ABC News reported.
“If there was any secure information, procedures would have been triggered that were never triggered,” Acosta said.
"There was good reason to believe the computers contained relevant — and potentially critical — information; and it was clear Epstein did not want the contents of his computers disclosed," the OPR report said.