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which Villafafia and Lourie believed that the state had intentionally failed to aggressively pursue a broader state indictment. One example illustrates this communication gap. In a September 20, 2007 email to Lourie asking him to read the latest version of the proposed “hybrid” federal plea agreement (calling for Epstein to plead to both state and federal charges), Acosta noted, “I don’t typically sign plea agreements. We should only go forward if the trial team supports and signs this agreement. I didn’t even sign the public corruption or [C]ali cartel agreements, so this should not be the first.” (Emphasis added.) In his email to Villafafia, Lourie attached Acosta’s email and instructed Villafafia to “change the signature block to your name and send as final to Jay [Lefkowitz].” (Emphasis added.) Villafafia raised no objection to signing the agreement. Acosta told OPR that he wanted to give the “trial team” a chance to “speak up and let him know” if they did not feel comfortable with the agreement. Villafafia, however, told OPR that she did not understand that she was being given an opportunity to object to the agreement; rather, she believed Acosta wanted her to sign it because he was taking an “‘arm’s length” approach and signaling this “was not his deal.” The fact that the top decision maker believed he was giving the line AUSA an opportunity to reflect and stop the process if she believed the deal was inappropriate, but the line AUSA believed she was being ordered to sign the agreement because her boss wanted to distance himself from the decision, reflects a serious communication gap. As another example, at one point, Villafafia, frustrated and concerned about the decisions being made concerning a possible resolution, requested a meeting with Acosta; in a sternly worded rebuke, Menchel rejected the request. Although Menchel told OPR that he was not prohibiting Villafafia from speaking to Acosta, Villafafia interpreted Menchel’s email to mean that she could not seek a meeting with Acosta. As a consequence, Acosta made his decision about a state resolution and the term of incarceration without any direct input from Villafafia. Acosta told OPR that he was unaware that Villafafia had sought a meeting with him and he would have met with her if she had asked him directly. OPR did not find any written evidence of a meeting involving both Acosta—the final decision maker—and Villafafia—the person most knowledgeable about the facts and the law—before Acosta made his decision to resolve the case through state charges or to offer the two-year term, and Villafafia said she did not have any input into the decision. Although a U.S. Attorney is certainly not required to have such direct input, and it may be that Menchel presented what he believed to be Villafafia’s views, OPR found no evidence that Acosta was aware of Villafafia’s strong views about, and objections to, the proposed resolution.”*° Two logistical problems hindered effective communication. First, the senior managers involved in the case—Acosta, Sloman, and Menchel—had offices located in Miami, while the offices of the individuals most familiar with facts of the case—Villafafia and, to a lesser extent, Lourie—were located in West Palm Beach. Consequently, Villafafia’s discussions with her senior 256 In her 2017 Declaration in the CVRA litigation, Villafafia stated that, given the challenges of obtaining victims’ cooperation with a federal prosecution, “I believed and still believe that a negotiated resolution of the matter was in the best interests of the [USAO] and the victims as a whole. The [USAO] had also reached that same conclusion.” Several subjects pointed to this statement as indicating that Villafafia in fact supported the NPA. In her OPR interview, however, Villafafia drew a distinction between resolving the investigation through negotiations that led to what in her view was a reasonable outcome, which she would have supported, and “this negotiated resolution”— that is, the NPA—which she did not support. 184 DOJ-OGR- 00023222