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Departments agreement not to prosecute in favor of the state action. In 2014, Edwards tries to ad Virginia Roberts, another of the original complainants, who has previously settled with Epstein, to the long-running suit. Roberts who was paid a settlement under the original terms of Epstein’s agreement— that he would pay attorney’s fees and not oppose any law suits against him—is now trying to overturn the agreement under which she was paid, and, with Edwards, further suing Epstein for $50,000,000. As the most vocal of the accusers, Roberts, with the Daily Mail being her prime outlet, emerges now with what is billed as a memoir of her “sex slavery” with Epstein, written ten years after the fact. She names a number of people as being at Epstein’s Island home, including Clinton and Al Gore and his wife, who Epstein’s lawyers insists were never there—proof available through secret service records. The FBI is now arguing that Roberts should not be party to the suit against the government because she refused to cooperate with the government in its investigation in 2007, hence has no standing as a victim. (At the same time, the FBI included her on the list of 40 victims with whom it mandated Epstein reach a settlement.) It is hard to find a more hyperbolic intersection of media and lawyers then in Epstein’s case. Edwards, over the six years of his law suit, tries to depose Clinton, Donald Trump, and Dershowitz—almost all of his targets coming directly from the original Vanity Fair and New York Magazine articles about Epstein. In addition to Prince Andrew as a British hot button, first connected to Epstein through Roberts’ interview with the Daily Mail in 2010, Clinton takes on a new role as Hillary spoiler through his connection, real or imagined, to Epstein and sex slaves. Almost everybody identified in any story about Epstein is approached by other media seeking to write about Epstein, often with financial incentives. No new details emerge. Every aspect of the current story is based on court filings describing events that may or may not have taken place prior to 2007. A recent Reuters story identified a charity that Epstein has not given money to in 15 years that said if he does give again, they would give it back. The world cleanly divides, with Epstein (and friends) behind secure walls and the Mail and social media and upholders of new norms, ever more incredulous and apoplectic that Epstein not only walks free but prospers too. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_022744