Jeffrey Epstein was photographed at the Santa Fe County Sheriff's Office on Aug. 17, 2010, when he provided information to determine whether he'd need to register as a sex offender. Epstein was told he would not be required to register two days later.
A former federal prosecutor who negotiated Jeffrey Epstein’s controversial 2008 plea deal defended it by pointing to the fact he was required to register as a sex offender.
“The world needed to be on notice that he was a sexual predator,” Alex Acosta, who served as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida at the time, said in 2019.
But in one of the states where Epstein held property, the financier wasn’t required to register: New Mexico.
Epstein pleaded guilty to procuring a minor for prostitution in Florida in 2008 after law enforcement identified dozens of girls who said Epstein sexually abused them. He served 13 months in jail and one year of house arrest, in a deal criticized as lenient.
When the New Mexico Department of Public Safety analyzed whether Epstein’s Florida conviction was equivalent to a New Mexico offense requiring sex offender registration, staff concluded it was not.
The reason Epstein didn’t have to register as a New Mexico sex offender has been at times erroneously attributed broadly to the age of consent in New Mexico — instead, at issue was New Mexico’s law related to sexual exploitation of children by prostitution.
In New Mexico, sexual exploitation of children by prostitution was — and still is — only a registrable offense if the minor is under age 16.
Epstein had been investigated in Florida for abuse of minorsas young as 14, but the minor included in his controversial plea deal was 17, according to the New Mexico Department of Public Safety, which reviewed law enforcement records from Florida it says are confidential.
Some ambiguity surrounds the age of Epstein’s victim included in the Florida plea — Epstein’s New Mexico attorney in 2010 wrote that she was 16 and 17 over the course of the alleged abuse — although either way he would have been exempt from registering in New Mexico.
Epstein owned Zorro Ranch in southern Santa Fe County from 1993 until his death in federal custody on charges of sex trafficking in 2019. Several women have alleged he abused them at the ranch. He also owned properties in Florida and New York and was required to register in both states.
As the January start of the legislative session approaches, some lawmakers hope the renewed attention will bring momentum to make changes to the sex offender registry to close what the Department of Public Safety has called the “Epstein loophole.”
