An internal FBI email from March 2020 detailing the technical challenges of extracting surveillance video from the Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC) following Jeffrey Epstein's death, revealing that key cameras were not recording due to hard drive failures.
This FBI New York Field Office email chain from August 2019 (forwarded in March 2020) provides a critical technical update on the MCC's surveillance system at the time of Jeffrey Epstein's death. The document reveals that DVR system #2, which covered cameras monitoring Epstein's area, experienced hard drive failures on July 29, 2019—nearly two weeks before his August 10, 2019 death. The email describes coordination between the FBI, the new Acting MCC Warden, and surveillance vendor NiceVision to extract video evidence while the facility was simultaneously upgrading its antiquated system.

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From: To: Subject: FW: MCC Video Extraction Date: Mon, 09 Mar 2020 21:30:40 +0000 See below Special Agent FBI New York Field Office Violent Crimes Task Force From Sent: Wednesday, August 14, 2019 5:48 PM To: Subject: Fwd: MCC Video Extraction FYSA Special Agent FBI New York I C-19 Violent Crimes Task Force Forwarded messa e From: ' Date: Aug 14, 2019 5:04 PM Subject: Fwd: MCC Video Extraction To: ' Cc: Forwarded message From: Date: Aug 14, 2019 3:14 PM Subject: M Video Extraction To:" Cc' Technical Update: At 12:30 pm today I met , the new Acting Warden of the MCC. Due to the transition of personnel at the MCC there has been some miscommunication between the MCC, the FBI, and the video surveillance vendor Nice Vision. After speaking with NYO EM and then talking with , the following is the plan to extract all relevant video surveillance from the MCC, which also allows for the MCC to maintain a video surveillance system for security purposes. As a quick background, the MCC has two (2) DVR surveillance systems which provide coverage for the entirety of EFTA00017950
the facility. Each system, DVR system #1 and DVR system #2, contain sixteen (16) hard drives which recorded the activity captured by the associated cameras. According to MCC staff, on 07/29/19, DVR system #2 had two to three hard drives fail causing most of that system to stop recording. Two of the three camera feeds of obvious interest resided on DVR system #2, meaning they were not recording at the time of the suicide on 08/10/19. Long before the hard drive failures and the suicide of the subject, the MCC had contracted with NiceVision to replace the antiquated system being utilized by the facility. NiceVision arrived at the MCC on Monday 08/12/19 to begin work on the installation. NiceVision has not completed the work on the system because they have not had access to the equipment room since FAVU arrived later that same day to export video from a camera feed on the working DVR system #1. After consultation with NYO CART and OTD, it has been determined the best chance for the FBI to extract and review video surveillance footage is to remove DVR system #2 immediately. This system is currently being extracted with the permission of MCC Acting Warden A member of NY CART will transport this system down to OTD today where a team from DFAS-DSAU will be waiting to receive and attempt a rebuild of the failed hard drives. This will be necessary in order for us to reconstitute the system later when we receive DVR system #1 at OTD. Another team from FBI FAVU is currently on-site working on exporting video from the third camera of interest connected to DVR system #1, which is currently operational and being utilized by the MCC. We will continue to export video from this camera back through at least 07/23/19, the date of the first alleged suicide attempt. Review has begun on this camera by C-19 and SDNY. At the same time C-19 will maintain a 24-7 presence in the equipment room to ensure integrity of the system and to also allow access for simultaneous work by NiceVision to complete the install of the new video surveillance system. NiceVision is currently once again working on the install and estimated a completion of the work as early as tomorrow (8/15/19). Once the new system is operational and FAVU has completed the download from the one known camera of interest residing on DVR system #1, we will collect it and send that down to OTD. We anticipate we could send down DVR system #1 down within the next two days. This will potentially allow us to reconstitute both systems down at OTD where we can determine what video is present. Then we will review the entirety of the recorded video surveillance for evidentiary purposes. It should be noted that the 30 day over-write in these systems were suspended for DVR system #1 and DVR system #2 on 08/12/19 and 08/10/19, respectively. Also of note, beside the attempt to rebuild the failed hard drives, there is a significant chance the hard drives pulled from DVR #2 on 08/10/19, are corrupted and/or encrypted since they were extracted while the system was running. We will know more about this issue once we can reconstitute the system and review. It is estimated the work described in this communication may take several weeks to complete. After all efforts have been made the possibility exists the rebuild of the hard drives and reconstitution of the systems may ultimately fail to produce the desired outcome. ■ EFTA00017951