Acosta Signs Non-Prosecution Agreement — Concealed from Victims

On September 24, 2008, U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta signed a federally-brokered non-prosecution agreement (NPA) with Jeffrey Epstein and his defense team.

Under the terms of the agreement, Epstein agreed to plead guilty to two Florida state charges — solicitation of prostitution and procurement of minors for prostitution. He would serve 13 months in Palm Beach County jail with extraordinarily lenient conditions (a work-release program allowing him to leave jail 12 hours per day, 6 days per week). In exchange, Epstein received sweeping immunity from all federal sex crime charges, and the immunity extended to unnamed co-conspirators.

The agreement was the product of months of aggressive lobbying by Epstein’s defense team. Epstein’s attorneys held multiple meetings with Acosta and his office, submitted extensive briefings, and successfully argued that a federal prosecution was legally risky. Acosta later said he was told by others that Epstein was an intelligence asset, though this claim has never been confirmed or independently proven.

Most critically: the NPA was deliberately concealed from Epstein’s victims. They were never informed of its contents or given an opportunity to be heard — a clear violation of the Crime Victims’ Rights Act (CVRA) of 2004. Victims’ attorneys Paul Cassell and Brad Edwards, representing Jane Doe clients, would file suit in 2008 alleging this violation. A federal judge in 2019 confirmed the CVRA violation.

The NPA remained largely secret from the public until investigative journalist Julie K. Brown and the Miami Herald published it as part of the “Perversion of Justice” series in November 2018.

Acosta resigned as U.S. Secretary of Labor in July 2019 after renewed public scrutiny of the NPA following Epstein’s federal arrest.