Dear Michele:

Dear Michele: here is my response to Mr. Acosta's letter: Mr. Epstein was never charged with a federal crime and as such matters at the united states attorney's office and the department of justice are supposed to be confidential. So I don't want to comment on any specific evidence or quote any of the parties in the matter. But since there has been so much put into the public record, and since you ask for a specific response to Mr. Acosta's letter, I can provide the following: I. We did present argument after argument why a proposed federal prosecution against Mr. Epstein was unsupported by the evidence. We detailed the so-called evidence during many meetings with prosecutors and agents. We were quite candid in disclosing all the evidence we had gathered in our investigation and I believe we made a convincing case why charges were not appropriate. I still believe that today. 2. I have never heard anyone mention writing a book about the Epstein case. 3. Mr. Acosta claims we negotiated in bad faith by appealing to the Department of Justice in Washington. Any person under investigation by a united states attorney, meaning any of the 94 such offices in the country, has the right to seek review by the department of justice and it is so provided for in their manual. Thus I can not imagine invoking this right could be construed as bad faith. In our system of justice people are given the right of appeal and there should be no implication of wrong doing by exercising it. 4. Finally Mr. Acosta mentions we looked for personal peccadilloes of prosecutors. I am not sure what he refers to but this never happened. We did point out misconduct and over reaching by certain people involved in the investigation. Not only is there nothing wrong with this but it is a necessary part of the process. There will always be people who abuse the great power of the government and we can not stand by silently when it occurs. As the great supreme court justice Louis Brandeis wrote: "The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding." EFTA01159527