Forensic experts are questioning the US government’s account of what happened on the last night of Jeffrey Epstein’s life, after a new review of CCTV footage uncovered a mystery orange shape near his prison cell hours before he died.
Nearly 11 hours of video from outside the cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Centre in New York was finally released this month – six years after the paedophile financier was found dead.
After he was found unresponsive in his jail cell on August 10, 2019, coroners at the time ruled that Epstein had hanged himself.
But a new analysis carried out by CBS News has raised questions over whether this assessment was correct.
In the 11-hour clip, which is already facing accusations of being doctored, a shadowy, orange object could be seen moving up the stairs to Epstein’s cell block at the New York prison at around 10.40pm the night before he was found dead.
While federal investigators initially concluded that the blob, which can only be seen briefly, was a corrections officer ‘carrying linen or inmate clothing’, forensic experts told CBS that it may have actually been another inmate.
Conor McCourt, a retired NYPD sergeant and forensic video expert, told the broadcaster: ‘Based on the limited video, it’s more likely a person in an [orange] uniform.’
Trump’s administration is already under fire for allegedly doctoring the supposedly ‘raw’ footage using Adobe Premiere Pro from two clips.
A shadowy, orange object could be seen moving up the stairs to Epstein’s cell block at the New York prison at around 10:40pm the night before he was found dead
Jeffrey Epstein (pictured) was found unresponsive in his cell early in the morning of August 10 and was later declared dead in hospital
One of the clips was originally four hours and 19 minutes long, but it had nearly two minutes and 53 seconds cut out.
The cut occurs at 11:58:58 pm – which is mere milliseconds before there is a one-minute gap in the tape. The second clip resumes at midnight on the dot.
Attorney General Pam Bondi blamed the gap on a ‘nightly system reset.’
Though the timing may suggest overlap, the metadata shows that the file was modified multiple times on May 23, 2025, over a span of more than three hours, contradicting the notion that this was ‘raw’ footage.
WIRED pressed the DOJ for comment on the edits, and a spokesperson replied in minutes, saying ‘Refer you to the FBI’. The FBI then declined to comment.
The latest confusion over the tape comes after the Mail revealed that Maxwell was grilled about Prince Andrew during her nine-hour meeting with the US Deputy Attorney General.
The 63-year-old convicted sex-trafficker – a former close friend of the Duke of York – answered all questions ‘honestly and truthfully’ as she was quizzed about Andrew and ‘more than 100 different people’ connected to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, her former boss and ex-lover.
While it is not known exactly what Maxwell said about the Duke, this is the first time she has ever been formally questioned about him. A source said: ‘This is the first time anyone has asked Ghislaine about any of the men.
President Donald Trump admitted that his falling out with Jeffrey Epstein took place after the billionaire pedophile ‘stole workers’ from his Mar-a-Lago club in the early 2000s
Donald Trump with then-girlfriend and future wife Melania Knauss, financier Jeffrey Epstein, and British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell at the Mar-a-Lago club in February 2000
‘She told the truth and didn’t back away from any questions. She wants the truth to come out.’
Andrew has always vehemently denied claims by Virginia Giuffre that she was sex-trafficked to him by Epstein when she was just 17.
The Prince paid Ms Giuffre a multi-million-pound sum to settle a civil suit with no admission of wrongdoing. Ms Giuffre committed suicide earlier this year.
Maxwell is serving 20 years in Tallahassee Federal Prison in Florida for procuring and grooming young girls to be sexually abused by Epstein.
This week’s extraordinary two-day meeting with US Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche took place on the orders of Donald Trump, who has found himself embroiled in a huge political row by promising – and then failing – to release the full Epstein Files.
The family of Jeffrey Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre demanded answers after President Donald Trump admitted he knew the billionaire pedophile ‘stole’ Giuffre from his Mar-a-Lago resort.
The president claimed on Tuesday that the convicted sex offender took Giuffre when she was just 16 years old and working as a locker room attendant at the spa at his Florida estate.
Trump is pictured in September 2000 with Ghislaine Maxwell, who is now set to testify before Congress about Epstein’s crimes
Giuffre was one of the most prominent and vocal accusers of Epstein and Maxwell before she took her own life at the age of 41 earlier this year
He told the Daily Mail that is why he had a falling out with Epstein.
Giuffre’s family now says it was ‘shocking to hear President Trump invoke our sister and say that he was aware that Virginia had been “stolen” from Mar-a-Lago.
‘It makes us ask if he was aware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal actions, especially given his statement two years later that his good friend Jeffrey “likes women on the younger side… no doubt about it,’ they said in a statement.
‘We and the public are asking for answers; survivors demand this.’
The family also hit out at Congress for considering to get Maxwell to testify about Epstein’s crimes.
‘If our sister could speak today, she would be most angered by the fact that the government is listening to a known perjurer. A woman who repeatedly lied under oath and will continue to do so as long as it benefits her position,’ the statement read.
‘Ghislaine Maxwell is a monster who deserves to rot in prison for the rest of her life for the extraordinary violence and abuse she put not just our sister Virginia through, but many other survivors, who may number in the thousands. A predator who thought only of herself, she destroyed the lives of girls and young women without conscience…’ the family said.
Giuffre was one of the most prominent and vocal accusers of Epstein and Maxwell before she took her own life at the age of 41 earlier this year.
Ghislaine Maxwell, pictured with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, was grilled about Prince Andrew during her nine-hour meeting with the US Deputy Attorney General, The Mail on Sunday can reveal
Andrew has always vehemently denied claims by Virginia Giuffre that she was sex-trafficked to him by Epstein when she was just 17 (pictured: Andrew and Ms Giuffre in 2001)
Maxwell was spotted returning to prison with a box of materials after she was grilled by Trump’s Department of Justice on Thursday
She has said she was recruited by Maxwell into Epstein’s sex ring in 2000 as a teenager working as a locker room attendant at the spa at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump seemed to confirm those reports in his remarks aboard Air Force One on Tuesday.
‘Everyone knows the people that were taken,’ he told reporters. ‘People were taken out of the spa hired by him.’
‘I didn’t know that. And then when I heard about it, I told him, I said, “Listen, we don’t want you taking our people, whether it was spa or not spa. I don’t want you taking people,” the president continued.
‘And he was fine. And then not too long after that, he did it again. And I said, “Out of here.”‘
Trump officially banned Epstein from his Mar-a-Lago club in 2004. But before that, both Epstein and Maxwell were photographed partying at the Palm Beach social club including with Trump’s then-girlfriend Melania.
Trump has offered a number of reasons over the years for his falling out with Epstein, who died in a New York prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.
He previously said he cut off contact with Epstein because he was a ‘creep.’
Other reports say the two men fell out over an oceanfront Palm Beach property that was being sold out of bankruptcy that each man wanted.
But now the president’s one-time friendship with the financier is coming under renewed scrutiny after the Trump administration denied reports that Epstein kept a list of rich and powerful people for whom he trafficked young girls.
The president has now been accused of a cover-up and has been facing questions about his relationship with Epstein ever since.
