Why Take Jeffrey Epstein Off of Suicide Watch?

And inexplicable decision leads almost immediately to the death of the world’s most dangerous federal inmate.

Here’s something that inspires zero confidence:

Attorney General William P. Barr said in a statement that he had asked the inspector general for the Justice Department to open an investigation “into the circumstances of Mr. [Jeffrey] Epstein’s death.”

How does the most obvious suicide risk in the country get taken off suicide watch and wind up dead in his prison cell within days?  According to the New York Times, it couldn’t have happened without the say-so of the prison psychologist.

Inmates can only be removed from the watch when the program coordinator, who is generally the chief psychologist at the facility, deems they are no longer at imminent risk for suicide, according a 2007 Bureau of Prison document outlining suicide prevention policies. The inmates cannot be removed from the watch without a face-to-face evaluation.

To take an inmate off suicide watch a “post-watch report” needs to be completed, which includes an analysis of how the inmate’s circumstances have changed and why that merits removal from the watch.

Under Bureau of Prison regulations, the government’s jails and prisons must have one or more rooms designed for housing an inmate on suicide watch, and the rooms must allow staff members to control the inmate without comprising their ability to observe and protect him. Every prison facility is required to have a suicide prevention program.

Suicide prevention cells must provide an “unobstructed view of the inmate” and “may not have fixtures or architectural features that would easily allow self-injury,” according to a Bureau of Prisons policy.

If I were investigating this, I would be so far up the “program coordinator’s” financial ass that they couldn’t spend a nickel for the next five years without me knowing about it.  Epstein had already tried to kill himself once (assuming that wasn’t a murder attempt) and had been on suicide watch for that reason. There should be “post-watch report” that explains which “circumstances” changed making the world’s most notorious child sex trafficker to the rich, noble and famous less inclined to off himself. In the best case scenario, this administrator made the worst judgment call in recorded history. It will truly suck to be them, even if Attorney General William Barr is about the last person I’d trust to get to the bottom of this.

Kind of amazing and coincidental that Epstein managed to hang himself while all alone in his cell on the very night that new names were released by the court.

They better keep Ghislaine Maxwell in bubble wrap because she is now the lone carrier of the warld’s most dangerous secrets.

 

Author: BooMan

Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.

9 thoughts on “Why Take Jeffrey Epstein Off of Suicide Watch?”

  1. I have been depressed all day that this slime ball managed to evade justice. I had also (didn’t realize it until I heard he died) hoped that some of our “elites” would finally be called to account for crimes against children. The duple catastrophe of Epstein offing himself and Barr taking over the investigation (including SDNY’s portion, which actually looked like it could go someplace) ensures that won’t happen (well, it will for any Democrats involved, because, well….Barr). Ever since Obama let the robosigners and banksters and Bushie war criminals walk, I’ve watched true accountability vanish except for us ‘littles, and it’s become epidemic with the talking anus’s administration. the hell with it, I’m going to bed.

    1. “I have been depressed all day that this slime ball managed to evade justice”

      The sick part is that I’m sitting here wondering if he’s actually dead.

  2. I heard a former Federal BOP employee call into a radio talk show yesterday. He said the chief psychologist at the prison, the one who makes the official determination as to when a prisoner is on or off suicide watch, is a GS-12 in the federal pay scale. Here’s what we’re talking about in terms of pay:

    Starting salary for a GS-12 employee is $64,490.00 per year at Step 1, with a maximum possible base pay of $83,840.00 per year at Step 10.

    So the max for this person is about $84K, not a lot for the NYC region. To have someone like this in charge of the accommodations for such a high profile, high risk prisoner is asking for trouble. Definitely check the finances of this person and those around them.

    Plus, what “psychologist” decides to take a prisoner off suicide watch after the first attempt a little over two weeks prior, especially when their environment hasn’t changed?

    None of this adds up, and as long as Barr is in charge of getting to the bottom of this, it won’t happen. I read the warden has been “reassigned” and the guards placed on leave, and I guess that’s supposed to be the reaction the public is supposed to accept that this has been handled. But that’s not the same as explaining the reason behind the facts of what happened, that are not explained by the absurdity of events that we are aware of thus far.

Comments are closed.