Newly released Department of Justice documents reveal that officials created a fake corpse using boxes and sheets to deceive media outlets during Jeffrey Epstein’s body transfer following his suicide at the Metropolitan Correctional Center.

Elaborate Deception Operation

According to FBI interview documents from 2019, New York City’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner officials and prison guards orchestrated an elaborate ruse on the morning of August 10, 2019. They constructed a phony body from boxes and sheets, loading it into a white medical examiner’s van while secretly transporting Epstein’s actual remains in a separate black vehicle. The operation successfully fooled most media outlets gathered outside New York Presbyterian Hospital.

Hospital staff participated by staging press crews at the front entrance while secretly loading Epstein’s body through the back. Most news organizations followed the decoy van, allowing the real transfer to proceed undetected. However, New York Post photographer William Farrington captured exclusive images of both the arrival at 7:30 a.m. and the departure in the black body bag.

Timeline of Events

Epstein was discovered dead in his cell at 6:30 a.m., apparently having hanged himself with a bedsheet. The disgraced financier’s death came while he awaited trial on federal sex trafficking charges. Farrington’s photographs showed emergency medical technicians attempting to revive the lifeless body as it arrived at the hospital, providing the only visual documentation of the controversial transfer operation.

Questions About Transparency

The revelation raises questions about official transparency during high-profile cases involving powerful figures. The deliberate deception of the press, while perhaps operationally justified, demonstrates the lengths to which authorities went to control information flow surrounding Epstein’s death. These DOJ files provide new insight into the coordination between multiple agencies during one of the most scrutinized deaths in recent American legal history, highlighting ongoing concerns about accountability and public access to information in sensitive cases.