In the lead up to Jeffrey Epstein’s second criminal indictment in 2019, the disgraced financier had “frantically” tried to turn his secretive compound in New Mexico into a “private municipality with its own governance structure and potentially its own law enforcement jurisdiction,” journalist Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez exclusively reported on Friday.
A resident of New Mexico, Valdes-Rodriguez has uncovered a number of revelations regarding Epstein largely revolving around Zorro Ranch, including that the property may have been used to surveil two U.S. nuclear weapons labs using software compromised by Israeli intelligence.
On Friday, Valdes-Rodriguez reported that Epstein had apparently worked with a wealthy golf resort developer-turned lawyer in a scramble to turn the sprawling compound into a “town” with its own “legal identity.”
The effort was halted, however, by a major legal hurdle: “the lack of people living on the land,” Valdes-Rodriguez wrote.
New Mexico law requires a geographical area being petitioned to be incorporated as a municipality to have “not less than one person per acre.” The petition must also carry the signature of “not less than two hundred qualified electors.”
To circumvent the legal obstacle, Epstein contacted Gerald Barton, the wealthy golf resort developer-turned lawyer, who told him of a past workaround he had used to get around similar residency requirements in Oklahoma.
“We were moving several people to the site to live in mobile homes. They would have no idea what we intended to do with the property nor would the governmental authority,” Barton wrote to Epstein in an email dated April 26, 2018, exactly three months before his death of melanoma.
“I had assumed that New Mexico law would be similar to Oklahoma’s and we would be able to choose those who would live on the property and be the spokesmen for the new town.”
Epstein’s reasons for exploring municipal status for his 7,600-acre property are unclear, but Valdes-Rodriguez noted the correspondence came just as famed reporter Julie K. Brown was “closing in on Epstein’s Florida operation,” and suggested he may have been looking to shift the bulk of his operations to a more secluded property where he could exert greater control over access.
However, Epstein’s inquiry was ultimately shot down by Barton, who recommended against pursuing the idea.
“Because my brief review of the New Mexico statutes leads me to believe you would have several public hearings and would be questioned on the motivation of the creation, I believe in the middle of this undeserved hysteria and the potential of an investigative reporter from the press, there is not a good risk-reward ratio,” Barton wrote. “Sorry.”
Now owned by Don Huffines, a billionaire businessman, GOP candidate and ally to President Donald Trump, Zorro Ranch was reportedly central to Epstein’s disturbing plan to “seed the human race with his DNA,” and is also alleged to be the burial site of “two foreign girls,” according to an FBI tip recently released by the DOJ. Investigations into Zorro Ranch were underway back in 2019 before being abruptly shut down at the request of the Trump administration’s DOJ.
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