© NY State Sex Offender Registry/NY State Sex Offender Registry/TNSThe estate of Jeffrey Epstein has temporarily suspended compensation offers to his victims.
MIAMI - Citing concerns that the estate of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein may not have access to cash, the executive running the Epstein Victims Compensation Fund announced Thursday a temporary suspension of compensation offers.
"Although I sincerely regret having to take this action, I have concluded that it is necessary to protect the interests of eligible claimants who have not yet resolved their claims through the Program," Jordana H. Feldman, the compensation fund's administrator, said in a statement. "Issuing a compensation offer that cannot be timely and fully funded and paid, consistent with the way the Program has operated to date, would compromise claimants' interests and the guiding principles of the Program."
In a letter earlier Thursday to lawyers for victims who have petitioned the fund for compensation, Feldman said she was notified by the estate's lawyers Wednesday that "it did not have sufficient liquidity to fully satisfy the most recent request for replenishment and that it could not predict when additional liquidity would be secured, prompting this announcement."
Liquidity is a catch-all reference to say that while the estate may be worth hundreds of millions of dollars, it must liquidate assets such as homes and vehicles and turn them into cash that can be transferred to the fund. There is a predetermined threshold by which the fund is to be replenished after payouts, and that threshold has been reached and the estate said it did not presently have sufficient available funds.
Feldman's commission has been operational since last June. The letter and a subsequent news release said the compensation fund will keep taking claims through the March 25, 2021, deadline for filing a claim. It said it will also make good on compensation determinations made before the Thursday announcement.
In a statement Thursday afternoon, the Epstein estate said that as of Dec. 31 the assets it held were valued at about $240 million, reflecting the estate's past payment of necessary tax payments and its funding of claims payments from the compensation program.
But because the great bulk of the estate's assets are things that need to be sold - residential properties, private investments and aircraft - the co-executors said they've tried for months to sell these assets to pay expenses and fund the compensation program.
"Regrettably, the Co-Executors' efforts to sell these assets have been hampered by the now nearly-year-long coronavirus pandemic, and its enormous adverse effect on local and global economies," said the statement from Daniel H. Weiner, a lawyer representing the Epstein estate. "In addition, the Estate has been forced to expend substantial funds in defending against multiple civil lawsuits and administrative proceedings, including attempting to clear recent fraudulent claims on title to the Estate's Palm Beach property."
The suspension comes just days after the state revealed in a filing to a probate court in the U.S. Virgin Islands that it had paid out nearly $50 million between June and Dec. 31 to Epstein's sexual abuse victims.
The estate did not disclose how many women received part of that $50 million sum, but the compensation fund, in a news release announcing the temporary suspension of future payments, said more than 150 complaints have been filed seeking compensation.
Buried in this week's filing by the estate were annexes of receipts and bank statements, which showed the Epstein estate had paid $190 million in estate taxes to the U.S. government late last year. These annexes also showed that liens placed on the estate by Denise George, the attorney general of the U.S. Virgin Islands, were complicating efforts to pay bills and handle estate matters.
George early last year brought a civil racketeering lawsuit against the estate, calling it an ongoing criminal enterprise and naming the co-executors of the Epstein estate - longtime lawyer Darren K. Indyke and accountant Richard Kahn.
The attorney general also clashed with the estate over creation of the fund, ultimately winning the inclusion last year of a noted sexual abuse expert to assist the fund in its work.
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