EPSTEIN
page 2 / 84 . OCR, unverified
7.
The BOP requires correctional officers assigned to
guard inmates at the MCC to conduct institution-wide counts of
inmates at regular, scheduled intervals to ensure that each inmate
is alive and accounted for within the MCC
(the "institutional
count")
On weekdays, the MCC conducts five institutional counts
at 4 p.m., 10 p.m., 12 a.m., 3 a.m., and 5 a.m.
Performing an
institutional count is one of the most basic and essential aspects
of a correctional officer's job, and the count is one of the most
basic and essential functions of daily operation of the MCC.
Two
officers are required to perform the institutional count for each
housing unit, including the SHU,
and are further required to
document their performance of the count on an official MCC form
called a count slip.
To perform the institutional count in the
SHU, two officers must walk from tier to tier to observe and count
each individual inmate.
Case 1:19-cr-00830-AT Document 1 Filed 11/19/19 Page 5 of 20
8.
On the count slip, both correctional officers are
required to fill in the date and time the count was performed,
write the total number of inmates physically present in the unit
counted, and then sign the count slip.
Once the correctional
officers have completed and signed the count slips, the count slips
are then collected and delivered to the Control Center, where
officers within the Control Center are responsible for comparing
the count slips from each housing unit to the institution's inmate
roster to ensure that each inmate is accounted for.
Only after
all the count slips are collected from each housing unit, and the
numbers on the slips are matched to the institution's inmate
roster,
can the institutional count
deemed
"cleared" or
completed.
incomplete,
If a
housing unit's count slip is incorrect or
then the
institution cannot
"clear"
the
count.
Instead, the count must be completely redone in that housing unit
via a more-intensive version of the institutional count called a
"bed book count," in which officers must compare every individual
inmate to the institution's inmate roster.
Records of each
institutional count, including the count slips, are provided to a
supervising official and retained by the MCC.
9.
In addition to the institutional count, the BOP
requires correctional officers assigned to the SHU to walk each of
the tiers of the SHU -
which is called a "round" -
every thirty
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minutes
("30-minute rounds").
Like the institutional counts,
correctional officers conduct 30-minute rounds to ensure that each
inmate is alive and accounted for within his cell.
Correctional
officers working in the SHU are required to complete a form, which
is reviewed and signed by their supervisor, documenting the date
and time of each 30-minute round in each tier of the SHU.
EPSTEIN'S PRIOR APPARENT SUICIDE ATTEMPT
10. On
July
6,
2019,
inmate
Jeffrey Epstein
was
arrested and detained at the MCC on sex trafficking charges.
On
July 10, 2019, Epstein was assigned to the SHU due to, among other
things, risk factors for suicidality and safety concerns relating
to housing him with the MCC's general population.
11. On July 23, 2019, while Epstein was housed in the
SHU, MCC officers responded to an emergency call, and found Epstein
on the floor of his cell with a strip of bedsheet around his neck.
MICHAEL THOMAS, the defendant, was one of the MCC officers who
responded to the incident.
Epstein was subsequently transferred
out of the SHU and was placed on suicide watch.
Inmates placed
on suicide watch are housed in a cell on the hospital wing floor
of the MCC,
and are watched twenty-four hours a day by a staff
member or a specially trained inmate companion.
12. Epstein remained on suicide watch for approximately
twenty-four hours,
and then was transferred to psychological
Case 1:19-cr-00830-AT Document 1 Filed 11/19/19 Page 7 of 20
observation, until July 30, 2019.
Psychological observation is
less restrictive than suicide watch, but inmates are still housed
in the hospital wing of the MCC and watched twenty-four hours a
day.
13. On July 30, 2019, Epstein was transferred back to
the SHU, and, at the direction of the MCC's psychological staff,
was required to have an assigned cellmate.
Epstein was also
assigned to the cell closest to the correctional officers' desk in
the common area of the SHU, which was approximately fifteen feet
from the cell.
Conducting the required institutional counts and
thirty-minute rounds in the SHU
were also part of the MCC' s
procedures for ensuring the safety of inmates, including Epstein.
EVENTS OF AUGUST 9-10, 2019
14. On
August
9,
2019,
Epstein's
cellmate
was
transferred out of the MCC in a routine, pre-arranged transfer at
approximately 8 a .m.
Despite the MCC' s psychological staff's
direction that Epstein have a