The autopsy of registered sex offender and multimillionaire financier Jeffrey Epstein has been completed, though most details of the report remain undisclosed. The alleged pedophile’s cause of death, according to an announcement from the New York City medical examiner late on Sunday, “is pending further information,” a common determination.
According to a report from The Daily Beast, Chief Medical Examiner Barbara Sampson said Epstein’s representatives hired celebrity pathologist Michael Baden “to conduct an independent autopsy and they were allowed to observe the autopsy.”
Baden is known as the “Death Correspondent” for Fox News, according to the Evening Standard, and has been involved in the high-profile deaths of John Belushi, Anna Nicole Smith, and Michael Brown, and testified at the infamous OJ Simpson trial. Dr. Baden has also “examined more than 20,000 bodies and was host of the HBO TV show Autopsy,” the outlet noted.
Epstein was found to have allegedly hanged himself on Saturday morning in his cell at the Metropolitan Correction Center (MCC) and was transferred to a hospital in Manhattan where he arrived in cardiac arrest, reports say.
If it is determined that Epstein did indeed die “at his own hand, his estate, whose members are unknown, could press a claim for wrongful death while he was in the custody of the state,” The Daily Beast reported, noting that it remains unclear if the disgraced financier’s body has been released, or to whom.
According to a New York Times report published on Sunday, Epstein was not checked every 30 minutes, as was supposed to be the case:
Mr. Epstein was supposed to have been checked by the two guards in the protective housing unit every 30 minutes, but that procedure was not followed that night, a law-enforcement official with knowledge of his detention said.
Additionally, the Times noted, Epstein “was supposed to have had another inmate in his cell,” according to three officials, “[b]ut the jail had recently transferred his cellmate and allowed Mr. Epstein to be housed alone, a decision that also violated the jail’s procedures, the two officials said.”
NBC reported on Saturday that Epstein was not on suicide watch at the time of the incident, conflicting with original reports. The Times similarly reported that Epstein was taken off suicide watch 11 days before he was reportedly found hanged in his cell. The registered sex offender was found with marks around his neck three weeks prior, apparently placing Epstein on suicide watch. As noted by The Daily Wire‘s Ashe Schow, it’s unclear, however, if the injury to his neck was from a suicide attempt, an attempt to get transferred to another prison, or an attack from another inmate.
According to a former MCC inmate who spoke to the New York Post on the condition of anonymity, there is “no way” Epstein could have pulled off killing himself in the Manhattan facility.
“There’s no way that man could have killed himself. I’ve done too much time in those units. It’s an impossibility,” the former inmate told the Post, noting that “between the floor and the ceiling is like eight or nine feet. There’s no way for you to connect to anything. You have sheets, but they’re paper level, not strong enough. He was 200 pounds — it would never happen.”