Prosecutors ‘crushed’ by workload of reviewing more than two million Jeffrey Epstein files

Official estimates of the documents have increased from initially “hundreds of thousands” to over 5 million pages as new investigative materials were identified.

500 personnel reviewing Epstein files

Earlier this month, it was reported that the DOJ had assigned more than 500 personnel, including 400 lawyers and 100 document analysts, to review the files. Officials state the delay is due to the “painstaking work” of redacting sensitive victim-identifying information required by law.

The massive review operation is also taking a toll on the federal prosecutors involved, Politico has reported.

All prosecutor assigned to review Epstein files

According to the report, almost every prosecutor in the Southern District of New York who isn’t handling an imminent or ongoing trial has been tasked with helping to review more than two million files to redact information about Epstein’s victims. Even the high-ranking executive staff and unit chiefs are also reviewing and redacting documents, often working weekends, it said.

Several prosecutors working on the narco-terrorism and drug trafficking case against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro have also assigned to work on the Epstein documents, a person familiar with the matter told Politico.

Prosecutors are being “crushed by the work,” one person told Politico. While people in the office hope the task will take no longer than a few more weeks, no one is really sure when it will be completed.

What DOJ told court

Last week, the DOJ, in a letter, told two federal judges that they are making “substantial progress” reviewing the documents.

The review has found “substantial” duplication in various files, so the estimated number of documents is “in flux,” the letter said.

“Due to the scope of this effort, platform operations require around-the-clock attention and technical assistance to resolve inevitable glitches due to the sheer volume of materials,” said the letter, which is signed by Jay Clayton, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York.

Clayton said prosecutors are working with victims and attorneys for victims to redact identifying information, even if, in some cases, that information was previously public.

“Following a process of conferring with victims and victim counsel about this issue, the Department has confirmed that, to the extent any victim requests redaction of personally identifying information of a document in the DOJ Epstein Library, the Department will redact that victim identifying information even if the document is (or was) otherwise available on a public court docket,” the letter said.

Release of Epstein files

Under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the DOJ was legally required to release all investigative files by December 19, 2025.

Until now, the DOJ has released just 12,285 documents, which comprise 125,575 pages of Epstein investigative material, which is less than one per cent of the total files in the government’s possession.