A suicide note allegedly written by convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was released on Wednesday by a federal judge after being sealed for years.
In the alleged note, Epstein suggests his innocence without proclaiming it while vowing to “say goodbye” on his own terms.
“They investigated me for month — FOUND NOTHING!!!” the note begins before claiming that the charges go back 15 years.
“It is a treat to be able to choose one’s time to say goodbye,” the note continues. “Watcha want me to do — Bust out cryin!! NO FUN.”
The note concludes with the words “NOT WORTH IT!!!” underlined.
Epstein’s cellmate, Nicholas Tartaglione, allegedly discovered the note when the billionaire was “found unresponsive with a strip of cloth wrapped around his neck” — an attempt he survived weeks before he was found dead at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Lower Manhattan, per the New York Times:
The note was made public on Wednesday by Judge Kenneth M. Karas of Federal District Court in White Plains, N.Y., who oversaw the cellmate’s case. The judge acted after The New York Times petitioned the court last Thursday to unseal the document and published an article in which Mr. Tartaglione described the note and how it came into his possession.
The Times has not authenticated the note, which was placed on the court docket Wednesday evening. The note repeats a saying — “bust out cryin” — that Mr. Epstein wrote in emails. It included another phrase — “No fun” — that Mr. Epstein also used in emails, as well as in a separate note found in his jail cell at the time of his death.
The note comes after the Justice Department released millions of pages related to Epstein. Tartaglione, the former cellmate, said that he found the note in a graphic novel after Epstein had been removed from his cell following the botched suicide attempt.
“I opened the book to read and there it was,” Tartaglione said.
At the time, however, Epstein claimed that Tartaglione had attacked him and that he was not suicidal — a charge Tartaglione has repeatedly denied.
“The note apparently became part of a drawn-out legal dispute among Mr. Tartaglione’s lawyers,” added the Times. “Documents related to the conflict were placed under a court seal to protect attorney-client privilege, the filings say.”
