When the Epstein Files are released...

[Innula Zenovka]

Random question: What if the UN determines there's evidence Donald Trump committed a crime against humanity. What happens then?

Nothing. The UN isn't a court. They could forward the evidence to the International Criminal Court, but since the US doesn't recognise the ICC nothing would happen. Theoretically the ICC could issue an international arrest warrant, as they have done with Putin and Netanyahu, which would put Trump at risk of arrest if he travelled outside the US, though I doubt anyone would have the nerve to arrest the incumbent president of the US when he disembarked from Air Force One.

UN special rapporteurs (the UN legal experts referred to) don't have any judicial or investigatory authority. All they can do is give their views on the basis of the information provided to them, often by NGOs or in press reports, which will rarely have been tested in court. Often, it has to be said, their opinions are more political than legal.

Certainly some recent comments by UN special rapporteurs about various events have seemed to be based on fundamental misunderstandings of the powers and jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.

 

[Noodles]

Random question: What if the UN determines there's evidence Donald Trump committed a crime against humanity. What happens then?

Please come take him away.

Please.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

In other news, Reuters report that New Mexico probes allegation of bodies buried near Epstein ranch.

It has to be said, though, that while the allegations certainly demand further investigation, their source is somewhat dubious and it's going to be difficult to locate any bodies buried on a property of that size.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

The Andrew formerly known as Prince?

 

[Free]

The Andrew formerly known as Prince?

The child rapist formerly known as Prince Andrew. Don't worry, it's a common mistake.

 

[Beebo Brink]

This, by Nick Cohen, provides a summary of the allegations about Mountbatten-Windsor's activities as trade envoy contained in Andrew Lownie’s book Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York, published before the Epstein files were released:

I would imagine that the damage to the current royal house is not so much that Andrew was sleazy and corrupt, but that it was known he was sleazy and corrupt and there were no repercussions for so very long. If even such a beloved monarch as Elizabeth II allowed this corruption to flourish, there are no reliable guard rails.

By all appearances, Prince William seems a man of strong integrity who would be less tolerant of abuses when in a position of authority, but you can't rely on voluntary personal ethics as the underlying mechanism of regulation. It's subject to the whims of each generation.

I'm curious to see now William navigates this drama and scandal.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Please come take him away.

Please.

We can only hope his diet will be his end - soon. I mean he's clearly showing signs of quick deterioration, voice and other stuff, he's morbidly obese and not listening to his doctors. So shouldn't take too long now.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Andrew has been released after the arrest.

UK ex-Prince Andrew released after arrest over alleged misconduct in office

Mountbatten-Windsor was stripped of his title last year over his friendship with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

www.aljazeera.com

 

[Sid]

We can only hope his diet will be his end - soon. I mean he's clearly showing signs of quick deterioration, voice and other stuff, he's morbidly obese and not listening to his doctors. So shouldn't take too long now.

That is what people were saying too during his first term if I recall correctly.
Wishful thinking. I wish for it too, but my real hope is that the midterm elections will swing the majorities in the Capitol in the right direction, so Trump can be stopped better.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

I thought the pressure of the job would have him pull a Harding. But he just ignores the job.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

That is what people were saying too during his first term if I recall correctly.
Wishful thinking. I wish for it too, but my real hope is that the midterm elections will swing the majorities in the Capitol in the right direction, so Trump can be stopped better.

Yes, but during his 1st term his health was still quite good. Now it is different: his incoherent blabber attacks are becoming more frequent, longer and stranger, his voice is strained, you can see the marks of his age on his hands, and overall if he would be Joe Biden the GOP would run a massive campaign attacking him for his decline.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

We can only hope his diet will be his end - soon. I mean he's clearly showing signs of quick deterioration, voice and other stuff, he's morbidly obese and not listening to his doctors. So shouldn't take too long now.

 

[detrius]

I love the Internet sometimes. Pam Bondi remixed:


View attachment 941

Here's the full version:


Did you recognize them? It's from the same people who made this (among other things):

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Lisa Bloom, who represents several of Epstein's victims:

The Epstein files toppled a prince and a lord in the UK. How has the US elite escaped? (Evernote Link because paywall)

It's not really the point of the article, but I'd suggest that the reason UK prosecutors are focussed on charges of misconduct in public office against Mountbatten-Windsor and potentially Mandelson rather than on Epstein's and, allegedly, Mountbatten-Windsor's victims is pretty simple -- when you've got email records that apparently show confidential documents being forwarded to unauthorised persons, or people in official positions apparently working clandestinely for the benefit of third parties rather carrying out the duties and responsibilities of their office, you've got strong evidence of misconduct.

Claims of historic sexual abuse are much more difficult to prove. They're not impossible to prove, of course -- British juries regularly convict in cases of rape and sexual abuse that were not reported until many years later -- but the files so far released contain what may be direct evidence of public office offences rather than simple allegations.

 

[Free]

Hmm.

DOJ Deleted Record Revealing That Maxwell Holds Potential Blackmail Over Trump

The document, which was re-posted after I reported the removal, shows Maxwell's lawyers possess three FBI interviews with an underage Trump accuser that haven't been released to the public.

sollenbergerrc.substack.com

In other words, this document shows that, in choosing to withhold three of the four interviews from the Epstein files, the DOJ has granted Maxwell potential blackmail on the sitting president of the United States. (That depends, of course, on what the victim said in those interviews, but it doesn’t look good for Trump. However, if the victim “exonerated” him, the public needs to know that as well, and you’d think he’d see common ground there.)

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Nine different regional British police forces are now investigating Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's ties with Epstein. These include four separate police forces investigating Epstein's use of airports in their districts for possible sex trafficking.

Which police forces are investigating Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to the UK and why?

The Metropolitan Police have issued a statement

Update on Met Police activity following Epstein files release

Following the further release of millions of court documents relating to Jeffrey Epstein by the United States Department of Justice, we are aware of the...

news.met.police.uk

It includes

Following the further release of millions of court documents relating to Jeffrey Epstein by the United States Department of Justice, we are aware of the suggestion that London airports may have been used to facilitate human trafficking and sexual exploitation.

We are assessing this information and are actively seeking further detail from law enforcement partners, including those in the United States.

Separately, the Met is identifying and contacting former and serving officers who may have worked closely, in a protection capacity, with Andrew Mountbatten‑Windsor. They have been asked to consider carefully whether anything they saw or heard during that period of service may be relevant to our ongoing reviews and to share any information that could assist us.

The protection officers' evidence could be particularly damning, and also potentially damaging to the royal family more generally, since they will presumably have logged their and the then prince Andrew's movements and visitors as a matter of course, which will raise all sorts of questions about who knew what and when.

Helen Lewis, writing in The Atlantic, makes the interesting suggestion that

In the United States, the Epstein affair is still seen primarily as a sex scandal. The financier was well known as a man who could easily find women—“no one over 25 and all very cute,” he told Elon Musk—to go on dates with his rich friends. (“Pro or civilian?” Steve Tisch, a co-owner of the New York Giants, asked about one such woman.) But here in Britain, this is a corruption scandal—and not just because Andrew sent Epstein confidential information about investment opportunities in Afghanistan.

I don't know how accurate that is of how the affair is seen in the US, but it's certainly the case here that it's seen primarily as a corruption scandal rather than simply a sexual one.

The Former Prince Andrew Never Should Have Forwarded Those Emails

He faces criminal penalties for allegedly leaking government secrets to Jeffrey Epstein.

www.theatlantic.com

Evernote Link

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Tale of two nations: Andrew’s UK arrest highlights US passivity on Epstein files

“Other countries, like the Brits, can hold their leaders and high-profile people accountable, yet here in the United States we continue to somehow obscure the facts,” says Olivia Troye, a former national security official. “We have a Department of Justice that is complicit in all of this and we can’t seem to hold people accountable in the United States of America. What message does that say to the world?”

 

[Beebo Brink]

I don't know how accurate that is of how the affair is seen in the US, but it's certainly the case here that it's seen primarily as a corruption scandal rather than simply a sexual one.

Yes, that's a pretty accurate assessment, more's the pity. Because to my mind, the sexual trafficking was simply one tactic in the drive to gain power, money, influence and concentrating that power in a small circle of people. The girls/boys/women were party favors or enticements to create blackmail leverage; these were all horrendous acts just in themselves, but they were in service to the larger goals of global financial gain and control. Sex is the thread that needs to be pulled to uncover the rot beneath.

 

[Free]

Yes, that's a pretty accurate assessment, more's the pity. Because to my mind, the sexual trafficking was simply one tactic in the drive to gain power, money, influence and concentrating that power in a small circle of people. The girls/boys/women were party favors or enticements to create blackmail leverage; these were all horrendous acts just in themselves, but they were in service to the larger goals of global financial gain and control. Sex is the thread that needs to be pulled to uncover the rot beneath.

Thanks for encapsulating what I've been thinking about this, but haven't been able to put into words. Mostly because of the outrage over it all.