Back to Results

DOJ-OGR-00023044.tif

Source: IMAGES  •  Size: 69.7 KB  •  OCR Confidence: 95.0%
View Original Image

Extracted Text (OCR)

for the Department’s Criminal Division, a position in which he served as Chief of Staff to Assistant Attorney General Alice Fisher. Lourie left the Department in February 2008 to enter private practice. Ann Marie C. Villafafia joined the USAO in September 2001 asa line AUSA. She served in the Major Crimes Section in Miami until January 2004, when she transferred to the West Palm Beach branch office. Villafafia handled the majority of the child exploitation cases in West Palm Beach, along with other criminal matters. In 2006, she was designated as the USAO’s first coordinator for Project Safe Childhood, a new Department initiative focusing on child sexual exploitation and abuse.” In 2006, Villafafia assumed responsibility for the Epstein investigation. As the line AUSA, Villafafia handled all aspects of the investigation. Villafafia determined the lines of inquiry to pursue, identified the witnesses to be interviewed, conducted legal research to support possible charges, and sought guidance from others at the USAO and in the Department. Villafafia, along with the FBI case agents and the FBI Victim Specialist, had direct contact with Epstein’s victims. She handled court proceedings related to the investigation. She drafted a prosecution memorandum, indictment, and related documents, and revised those documents in response to comments from those in her supervisory chain of command. Villafafia participated in meetings between members of the USAO and counsel for Epstein, and prepared briefing materials for management in preparation for those meetings and in response to issues raised during those meetings. Although Acosta made the decision to utilize a non-prosecution agreement to resolve the federal investigation and approved the terms of the NPA, Villafafia was the primary USAO representative negotiating with defense counsel and drafting the language of the NPA, under her supervisors’ direction and guidance, and she signed the NPA on behalf of the USAO. Thereafter, Villafafia monitored Epstein’s compliance with the NPA and addressed issues relating to his conduct. After two victims pursued a federal civil lawsuit seeking enforcement of their rights under the Crime Victims’ Rights Act (CVRA), 18 U.S.C. § 3771 (‘the CVRA litigation” or “the CVRA case”), in July 2008, Villafafia served as co-counsel to the lead attorney representing the USAO until February 2019, when the USAO was recused from handling the litigation? Villafafia left the USAO in August 2019 to join another federal government agency. The following chart shows the USAO positions filled by the subjects, or other USAO personnel, during the period of the Epstein investigation. 2 Project Safe Childhood is a nationwide initiative launched by the Department in May 2006 to combat the growing epidemic of technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. 3 After the district court issued its February 21, 2019 opinion finding misconduct on the part of the government, the Department re-assigned the CVRA case to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. DOJ-OGR- 00023044

Document Preview

DOJ-OGR-00023044.tif

Click to view full size

Extracted Information

Dates

Document Details

Filename DOJ-OGR-00023044.tif
File Size 69.7 KB
OCR Confidence 95.0%
Has Readable Text Yes
Text Length 3,355 characters
Indexed 2026-02-03 20:32:08.768812