Newly Released Memo Shows Jeffrey Epstein Was Target of 2010 DEA Probe Over Suspicious Money Transfers

A previously undisclosed Drug Enforcement Administration investigation opened in 2010 named Jeffrey Epstein and 14 other individuals as targets of a federal probe into suspicious money transfers believed to be tied to illegal narcotics and prostitution. The existence of the probe emerges from a newly released document now publicly available through the Department of Justice's Epstein files library.

'DEA reporting indicates the above individuals are involved in illegitimate wire transfers which are tied to illicit drug and/or prostitution activities occurring in the U.S. Virgin Islands and New York City,' the 2015 document states.

The 69-page memo is marked 'law enforcement sensitive' and remains heavily redacted - the names of the 14 other targets and much of the investigation's substance are withheld. It was drafted in connection with a DEA request to an Organised Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces Fusion Center in Virginia, seeking information from other federal agencies.

According to CBS News, which first reported the document's contents, a law enforcement source said the request indicated the matter was part of a 'significant' investigation rather than a routine information inquiry. For the DEA to have opened the case within that framework, the same source confirmed, there would have had to be an established drug nexus.

The document carries a DEA case number with an opening date of 17 December 2010 in New York and was listed as 'judicial pending' at the time the memo was drafted five years later.

One source told CBS News that the designation suggests investigators may have been awaiting court approval for search warrants or other legal action. A second source believed it more likely indicated an arrest connected to the case had already been made.

$50 Million in Suspicious Transfers

The document details approximately $50 million (£39.5 million) in suspicious wire transfers recorded between 2010 and 2015. Most of the individuals linked to those transactions remain redacted. The DOJ appears to have inadvertently failed to redact the name of a Polish fashion model identified in connection with roughly $2 million (£1.6 million) of the transfers. Emails between her and Epstein were included in the release, indicating a personal relationship. CBS News is not identifying the woman at the request of her attorney, who said she was a survivor of Epstein's.

Bank accounts linked to Epstein in the memo span Switzerland, France, the Cayman Islands, and New York. Two companies associated with him are named: SLK Designs LLC and Hyperion Air. Hyperion Air served as a holding company for his aircraft. SLK Designs was operated by two women named as potential co-conspirators in Epstein's 2008 non-prosecution agreement with the federal government.

Records show both companies were formed and controlled by Epstein's attorney Darren Indyke. An attorney for Indyke previously told CBS News that his client 'did not socialise with Mr. Epstein' and rejected as categorically false any suggestion that Indyke knowingly facilitated or assisted in Epstein's crimes. No court has found Epstein's attorneys committed any wrongdoing.

A Pattern of Missed Opportunities

The newly disclosed DEA investigation adds to a long record of federal agencies investigating Epstein across multiple jurisdictions without ever bringing charges that reflected the full scope of his alleged conduct.

In 2008, under then-US Attorney R. Alexander Acosta, federal prosecutors in Florida struck a deal allowing Epstein to plead guilty to state prostitution charges. He served just 13 months in a county jail. The agreement shielded Epstein and named co-conspirators from federal charges and was negotiated without notifying victims - a court later found that it was a violation of the Crime Victims' Rights Act. The Justice Department's own Office of Professional Responsibility concluded in November 2020 that prosecutors showed 'poor judgment' in crafting the arrangement, though it stopped short of finding professional misconduct, according to CNN.

The DEA memo also references several other previously unknown investigations linked to Epstein: an Immigration and Customs Enforcement probe in West Palm Beach, opened in 2006 and closed in 2008; an ICE inquiry in Las Vegas, opened in 2009; an ICE case in Paris designated Operation Angel Watch, opened in June 2013 and closed months later; and an FBI investigation opened in 2006 that remained active as of 2015.

Sources involved in the 2018 federal sex trafficking case brought by the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York - which led to Epstein's arrest in July 2019 - told CBS News those prosecutors were entirely unaware of the earlier DEA investigation. Epstein died in August 2019 while awaiting trial. His death was ruled a suicide.

The Broader Files Release

The DEA document was found within Data Set 9 of the DOJ's Epstein files library, which the department has described as containing email evidence and internal DOJ correspondence, including material relating to the 2008 non-prosecution agreement.

The Epstein Files Transparency Act, signed by President Trump on 19 November 2025, required the DOJ to make all relevant files publicly available. On 30 January 2026, the department released over 3 million additional pages, 180,000 images, and 2,000 videos - bringing the total to nearly 3.5 million pages, according to the DOJ. The department identified approximately 6 million potentially responsive pages in total; Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle have pressed for answers on why the remainder was withheld.

The OCDETF programme itself - the federal anti-drug enforcement body whose Fusion Center was named in the DEA memo was established by President Reagan in 1982 and now operates as the largest anti-crime task force in the United States, the DOJ revealed. It coordinates multi-agency investigations into drug trafficking, money laundering and transnational organised crime.

Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon and ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, said the findings point to criminal activity extending well beyond Epstein's known offences. 'It appears Epstein was involved in criminal activity that went way beyond pedophilia and sex trafficking, which makes it even more outrageous that Pam Bondi is sitting on several million unreleased files,' Wyden told CBS News.