On Tuesday morning, CBS News reported that “shouting and shrieking” was heard from inside registered sex offender and multimillionaire financier Jeffrey Epstein’s jail cell at Metropolitan Correction Center the morning he died.
“CBS News has learned that the morning of Jeffrey Epstein’s death there was shouting and shrieking from his jail cell. Guards attempted to revive him while saying ‘breathe, Epstein, breathe,'” the report said.
As noted by journalist Yashar Ali, the report is not entirely clear about whom all the “shouting and shrieking” was coming from. “This CBS news story is poorly written. It’s unclear if the shrieking is from the guards or from Epstein or someone else,” Ali tweeted.
As previously noted by The Daily Wire, it was announced on Sunday night that Epstein’s autopsy had been completed, though most details of the report remain undisclosed. According to an announcement from the New York City medical examiner, his cause of death “is pending further information,” a common determination.
According to multiple media reports, Epstein was found to have allegedly hanged himself on Saturday morning in his MCC cell and was transferred to a hospital in Manhattan, where he arrived in cardiac arrest. According to CBS News, Epstein’s body was identified by his estranged brother Mark.
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,” The Daily Beast reported. 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. The doctor has also “examined more than 20,000 bodies and was host of the HBO TV show Autopsy,” the outlet noted.
Though initial reports claimed Epstein was on suicide watch at the time of his apparent suicide, The New York Times said this week that the disgraced financier was taken off suicide watch 11 days before he reportedly hanged himself.
The registered sex offender was found with marks around his neck three weeks ago, but, as noted by The Daily Wire‘s Ashe Schow, it’s unclear 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.
The Times also reported that Epstein was supposed to be checked on every half-hour, but the jail failed to do so. “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,” the report stated.
According to The Washington Post, Epstein’s cellmate was abruptly transferred to another cell on Friday, hours before Epstein hanged himself. The sudden transfer is being investigated.