A private Jewish boys school in North Dallas received three checks totaling $28,000 from a bank account controlled by convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in 2008 and 2009 - payments sent while Epstein was registered as a sex offender and serving time in a Florida jail - according to a report published Tuesday by the Dallas Morning News.
The Texas Torah Institute received two checks in 2008 and one in 2009. The first two checks were written after lawsuits from two girls alleging abuse had been made public, and while Epstein was in prison after pleading guilty to solicitation.
The first check, for $3,000, cleared Epstein's account in July 2008. The second, for $10,750, cleared in October of the same year. The third check, for $14,400, cleared in August 2009, about a month after Epstein was released from custody. All three checks were written from an account in the Virgin Islands, where Epstein owned an island that investigators allege he used to traffic and sexually abuse young girls. The checks appear to have been signed by Harry Beller, Epstein's accountant.
The Morning News could find no accompanying emails or other documents explaining the payments to the Texas Torah Institute. The files contain other checks and electronic fund transfers to a number of schools, often documented as tuition payments for children of Epstein's employees.
The checks are contained in the "Epstein Files," a vast trove of documents released recently by the U.S. Department of Justice. A Dallas Morning News reporter spoke with a woman at the school's office last week and provided copies of the checks. The News also reached out by phone and email. Representatives from the school did not respond to requests for comment.
The Epstein files reveal that Epstein made tuition payments to at least 19 other schools, including preparatory schools, daycare facilities, children's day camps, language-immersion schools, a finishing school in Sweden, and multiple Jewish education centers.
The Dallas connections in the files extend beyond the Texas Torah Institute. Dallas crisis communications consultant Merrie Spaeth, who helped Epstein manage his public image around his 2008 guilty plea, later emailed him writing "We're here if you want help. We think the world of you." She later told the Morning News she was "embarrassed" about the correspondence. Dallas-based Match.com provided Epstein with suggested dating profiles of young women in 2012. And a birthday letter to Epstein described as "raunchy and obscene" was written by Dallas businessman Terry Kafka, a childhood friend of Epstein's.
Epstein pleaded guilty in Florida in 2008 to two charges of solicitation of prostitution, one involving a minor, and was required to register as a sex offender. In 2019, he was charged with sex trafficking of minors and accused of abusing dozens of underage girls. He died in jail that year while awaiting trial; his death was ruled a suicide.
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