Jeffrey Epstein claimed New York federal prosecutors told him he could walk free if he agreed to implicate Donald Trump, according to his ex-cellmate.
After his arrest on child sex-trafficking charges in July 2019, Epstein was transferred to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan — where he shared a cell with ex-cop Nicholas Tartaglione, who was awaiting trial before being convicted on a quadruple-murder charge.
Tartaglione, 57, now claims that Epstein, who died a month after being arrested, told him prosecutors had offered to cut a deal if he’d snitch on President Trump, who was then in his first term.
“Prosecutors … told Epstein that if he said President Trump was involved with Esptein’s crimes he would walk free. in a petition to be pardoned,” Tartaglione claims in a pardon application filed in July and obtained by The Post.
“Epstein told me that [lead prosecutor] Maurene Comey said that he didn’t have to prove anything, as long as President Trump’s people could not disprove it. According to Maurene Comey, the FBI were ‘her people, not his [President Trump’s],’ ” the filing states.
The papers don’t specify what crimes Trump would have been implicated in. At the time of his death, Epstein was charged with sex trafficking and conspiracy, but was also suspected in a laundry list of other crimes — from financial misdealing to money laundering and blackmail.
Comey, who acted as lead prosecutor in Tartaglione’s case, was fired by the Justice Department in July. Attempts to reach her for comment were unsuccessful, while the Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment.
Tartaglione added in his petition that Epstein told him “President Trump was not involved in Epstein’s crimes.”
The two men shared a bunk until Epstein’s first suicide attempt on July 23, 2019, when he was discovered in his cell with bruising on his neck. He was then placed on suicide watch in a secure unit and given a different cellmate when he returned.
Epstein was found dead alone in his cell on August 10 after having hung himself.
His death was ruled a suicide, but lapses in security and protocol at the correctional facility, and a lack of evidence collected at that time, have led to many questions.
A former K9 officer in Westchester, Tartaglione was convicted of killing four men after a 2016 cocaine deal went wrong and he believed a worker at his animal sanctuary had stolen $230,000.
The ex-cop claims in his pardon bid that the prosecution was flawed and that evidence was manipulated by cops to frame him for the murders.
In his petition, Tartaglione alleges a mobile phone involved with the case was tampered with to add his name as a contact after it had been confiscated. He and his lawyers claim video evidence was “altered, spliced, mutilated and destroyed” to suit the prosecution.
The pardon request claims the man who worked for Tartaglione, Marcos Cruz, confessed to setting up the murders for a Mexican cartel, but was convinced by an investigator to change his story.
Tartaglione also claims the star witness at trial, Joseph Biggs — a bodybuilder and school security guard — only implicated him after meeting with prosecutors 30 times and repeatedly lied and fabricated information on the stand.
Biggs was sentenced to 17 years in 2024 for his role in the scheme, after admitting to pulling the trigger of a gun which killed one of the men. He had been facing life, but his sentence was reduced due to his cooperation.
Upon a jury finding him guilty in 2024, the judge slammed Tartaglione, saying he cared more about animals than the people he killed, calling him delusional and racist and citing the overwhelming evidence against him, ABC 7 news reported.
Tartaglione claims there have been numerous attempts on his life since Epstein’s death, leaving him injured and with a metal plate in his head.
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