AG: `Irregularities' found at jail where Epstein died

NEW YORK — Attorney General William Barr said Monday that there were “serious irregularities” at the federal j ail where Jeffrey Epstein took his own life as he awaited trial on charge she sexually abused under age girls.

The 66-year-old financier was found Saturday morning in his cell at the chronic ally shortstaffed Metropolitan Correctional Center, in a unit known for holding notorious prisoners under extremely tight security.

“I was appalled, and indeed the whole department was, and frankly angry to learn of the MCC's failure to adequately secure this prisoner ,” Barr said at a police conference in New Orleans .“We are now learning of serious irregularities at this facility that are deeply concerning and demand a thorough investigation. The FBI and the office of inspector general are doing just that.”

He added: “We will get to the bottom of what happened and there will be accountability.”

The manner in which Epstein killed himself has not been announced. An autopsy was performed Sunday, but New York City Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Barbara Sampson said inv es tigators were awaiting further information.

A private pa tho logist, Dr. Michael Baden, observed the autopsy at the request of Epstein's lawyers. Bad en was the city's chief medical examiner in the late 1970s and has been called as an expert witness in highprofile cases, including O. J. Simpson' s 1995 murder trial.

Epstein had been placed on suicide watch after he was found in his cell a little over two weeks ago with bruises on his neck, a person familiar with the jail's operations told The Associated Press. But he had been taken off the suicide watch at the end of July, said the person, who wasn't authorized to discuss jail operations publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Inmates on suicide watch are subjected to 24 hours per day of “direct, continuous obs er vation,” according to U.S. Bureau of Prisons policy. They are also issued tear-resistant clothing to thwart attempts to fashion nooses and are placed in cells that are stripped of furniture or fixtures they could use to kill themselves.

After he was taken off suicide watch and returned to the jail' s special housing unit, Epstein was supposed to have been checked on by a guard about every 30 minutes. But investigators have l earned those checks weren' t done for several hours before Epstein was found unresponsive, according to a second person familiar with t he episode. That person was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and also spoke on condition of anonymity.

The jail does have a video surveillance system, but federal standards don't allow the use of cameras to monitor areas where prisoners are likely to be undressed unless those cameras are monitored only by staff members of the same gender as the inmates. As a practical matter, that means most federal jails nationwide focus cameras on common areas, rather than cell bunks.

Lindsay Hayes, a nationally recognized expert onsuicidep revention behind bars, said that cameras are often ineffective because they require a staff member to be dedicated full time to monitoring the video feed 24 hours a day.

“It only takes three to five minutes for someone to hang themselves,” said Hayes, a project director for the National Center on Institutions and Alternatives. “If no one is watching the screen, then the camera is useless. There area lot of suicides that just end up being recorded.”