The judge did not argue about the authenticity of documents submitted to the court as part of his former cellmate’s criminal case.
Published May 7, 2026
A document purported to be a suicide note written by disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein has been released by a New York judge.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Kenneth Karas did not prove the memo’s authenticity, merely finding it a judicial document subject to public access rights.
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The documents, released Wednesday, were filed as part of the criminal case of Epstein’s cellmate, Nicholas Tartaglione, a former police officer and convicted murderer. The financier, a convicted sex offender, was found dead in a Manhattan jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges in what authorities said was a suicide.
Tartaglione’s lawyer said he discovered the note while living with Epstein in a cell for about two weeks in July 2019. A handwritten note on a yellow legal pad had a simple message:
“They searched me for a month and found nothing!!! Hence the 15 year old charges,” the memo said.
“It’s so nice to be able to choose the time to say goodbye. Look what you want me to do – cry!! It’s not fun – it’s not worth it!!”
Tartaglione, who is serving four consecutive life sentences for drug-related murders, previously mentioned the existence of the memo in a podcast interview.
According to Tartaglione’s public account, the note was tucked inside a book in the communal cell. Mr. Epstein passed away a few weeks later, on August 10, 2019.
The existence of this memo drew renewed attention following a report in the New York Times last year. The paper reported that the document has never been viewed by federal investigators and is not among the millions of Epstein-related documents released by the Justice Department in recent years.
The New York Times had formally asked Judge Karas to be released.
Epstein’s influential social circle included billionaires, celebrities and politicians, and the circumstances surrounding his death have long been a source of curiosity.
Last year, in a rare bipartisan effort, Congress passed a bill requiring the Justice Department to release all files related to the Epstein investigation.
U.S. President Donald Trump, who acknowledged his past friendship with Epstein, initially opposed the bill, but signed it into law in November. The Justice Department has since released millions of documents, but lawmakers have questioned how much of a total it has released.
Lawmakers are also pursuing their own investigations into Epstein, subpoenaing several current and former U.S. officials to testify, including the husband-and-wife team of former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
On Wednesday, Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick appeared before the House Oversight Committee.
Ahead of the hearing, the Republican chairman of the committee, Rep. James Comer, said Mr. Lutnick was not “100 percent truthful” about his relationship with Mr. Epstein.
Lutnick said on his podcast that he and Epstein cut ties in 2005, but documents show they met several times by 2012.
The relationship with Epstein is not in itself incriminating. To date, no one has been criminally charged in the United States in connection with the financier’s alleged crimes.
Several officials have been charged elsewhere, including Britain’s Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Prince Andrew, and former British ambassador Peter Mandelson.
