From CBS News: A federal judge in New York on Wednesday declined the Justice Department’s request to unseal grand jury material in the case of late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, saying prosecutors had failed to demonstrate that “special circumstances” warranted the disclosure.
Judge Richard Berman of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York issued his ruling in a 14-page decision denying the government’s motion to unseal the documents.
Berman wrote that the grand jury material in question includes the testimony of just a single witness, an FBI agent “who had no direct knowledge of the facts of the case and whose testimony was mostly hearsay.” The documents the government was seeking to unseal included roughly 70 pages of transcripts of the agent’s two presentations to the grand jury, a PowerPoint exhibit and a call log.
Berman noted that the Justice Department’s files on Epstein dwarf those stemming from the grand jury. Proceedings before grand juries are typically kept secret.
“A significant and compelling reason to reject the Government’s position in this litigation is that the Government has already undertaken a comprehensive investigation into the Epstein case and, not surprisingly, has assembled a ‘trove’ of Epstein documents, interviews, and exhibits. And, the Government committed that it would share its Epstein investigation materials with the public,” Berman wrote.
The judge argued that the DOJ is the “logical party” to make disclosures to the public on the case, and said, “The information contained in the Epstein grand jury transcripts pales in comparison to the Epstein investigation information and materials in the hands of the Department of Justice.”
JUST IN: Judge Berman agrees that effort by DOJ to unseal Epstein grand jury files is a “diversion” when DOJ could just release a trove of far more comprehensive documents without court involvement. https://t.co/Kc4bXUTG4u pic.twitter.com/X1t7Qg1s2O
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) August 20, 2025
BREAKING: A federal judge declines to unseal grand jury material in the Jeffrey Epstein case. https://t.co/A592GAXeU0
— CBS News (@CBSNews) August 20, 2025
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