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Oversight Panel

The House Oversight Committee has released a set of roughly 70 photographs from the estate of late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

This marks the third release from a larger collection of more than 95,000 images the committee has secured from Epstein's estate. It features photographs of passages from the literary work Lolita written across a woman's body, and redacted images of women's foreign passports.

This release arrives just hours before the 19th of December due date for the DOJ to release all documents associated with its inquiry into Epstein.

"These new photographs pose additional questions about what exactly the Department of Justice has in its custody," stated the senior Democrat of the panel, Robert Garcia.

What's in the Images Released

A number of the photographs released on Thursday show Epstein in discussion with professor and activist Noam Chomsky aboard a personal aircraft; Bill Gates positioned beside a woman whose features is redacted; Steve Bannon sitting at a desk opposite Epstein, and previous Alphabet president Sergey Brin at a evening meal.

Committee

These are the latest wealthy, prominent figures to be pictured in Epstein's estate images disclosed by the House Oversight Committee - previously released images also include US President Donald Trump and past president Bill Clinton, as well as film director Woody Allen, former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, attorney Alan Dershowitz, Andrew Mountbatton-Windsor, and additional individuals.

Appearing in the photographs is does not constitute indication of any illegal activity, and many of the photographed men have stated they were never involved in Epstein's unlawful actions.

In a press release accompanying the photo release, Democrats on the US House Oversight Committee stated the Epstein property holders did not supply context or timeframes for the images.

"Photographs were selected to provide the general populace with clarity into a representative sample of the photographs acquired from the estate, and to offer insights into Epstein's associates and his exceptionally disturbing activities," the announcement says.

Committee

The disclosure also includes a number of photos of quotes from the Vladimir Nabokov book Lolita written in ink across various areas of a female's body, like her upper body, feet, hip, and rear. Lolita recounts the tale of a adolescent who was groomed by a adult literature professor.

One passage from the novel scrawled across a female's upper body says, "Lo-lee-ta: the point of the tongue traveling of three steps down the palate to land, at three, on the teeth".

The release also contains a number of photographs of women's travel documents and ID papers from states around the world, including Lithuania, Russia, the Czech Republic, and Ukraine.

Oversight Panel

The majority of the data on the documents, like identities and dates of birth, is censored but the committee indicated in a announcement that the passports pertain to "females whom Jeffrey Epstein and his conspirators were engaging".

A further image shows Epstein seated at a desk in close proximity flanked by three female figures whose faces have been obscured - a first has her hand on Epstein's torso under his garment, and a second is leaning to examine a adjacent device. Epstein can be seen to be helping the final person attach a wristband.

Investigative Body

A further image released is a screenshot of SMS messages from an unknown sender who claims they have been supplied "a number of girls" and are requesting "$1000 per girl".

Photo Disclosure Occurs Prior to DOJ Due Date

The committee has many thousands of images in its holdings from the Epstein estate, which are "simultaneously graphic and mundane," its press release on Thursday noted.

The oversight panel first issued a subpoena to the estate of Epstein, who died in a New York jail in 2019 while pending legal proceedings on accusations of human trafficking, in August.

The images and files the Epstein estate provided to the body are different than what is commonly referred to "the Epstein documents". That material are papers under the justice department's custody related to its independent probe into Epstein.

In accordance with the recently passed law, which the President signed into law recently, the DOJ has a deadline of 19 December to release its files. The extent of what's included in the DOJ's documents is unclear, and it's likely that a significant portion of the material will be extensively obscured, comparable to Congressional documents