Epstein's Fake Austrian Passport Discovered by FBI

Event Details

During searches of Jeffrey Epstein’s Manhattan townhouse at 9 East 71st Street following his July 6, 2019 federal arrest, FBI agents discovered a fraudulent Austrian passport. The passport listed Epstein under a different name and included a photograph of him but gave a Saudi Arabian address.

The discovery was disclosed at Epstein’s bail hearing and was cited by prosecutors as significant evidence of flight risk. Southern District of New York prosecutors argued that a man who possessed a fake foreign passport under an assumed name with a foreign address was precisely the profile of a defendant who, if released, would immediately flee international jurisdiction.

The passport appeared to date to the 1980s, raising questions about when it was obtained and what it had been used for. No conclusive public accounting has explained why Epstein had the document.

The passport’s existence fed the intelligence-connection theories that surrounded Epstein: obtaining a legitimate-looking passport under a false name generally requires connections to sophisticated document forgery or to entities capable of producing such documents. The Saudi address added an additional layer of international network speculation.

Judge Richard Berman cited the passport among factors in his July 18, 2019 decision denying Epstein bail.