A prison guard overseeing Jeffrey Epstein the night he was found dead was overheard talking about covering up the paedophile tycoon’s death in a New York City jail, an inmate told the FBI.
The inmate awoke on the morning of Epstein’s death on August 10, 2019, to a loud commotion in the Special Housing Unit (SHU) where he and Epstein were jailed, a five-page handwritten FBI report of the interview with the inmate reads.
‘Breathe! Breathe!’ echoed down the halls of the Metropolitan Correctional Center as officers attempted to resuscitate the hanged child sex offender at 6.30am.
Then he said he heard one officer say ‘Dudes, you killed that dude.’
A woman’s voice then snapped, ‘If he’s dead, we’re going to cover it up and he’s going to have an alibi – my officers,’ the FBI report released in the Epstein files said.
The inmate identified that female voice as Tova Noel, 37 – one of two prison guards fired for falsifying records that they had made their rounds of the cells that night when they had not.
Noel and Michael Thomas were charged for this, but later their charges were dropped.
After it was discovered that Epstein had died, inmates rumoured that ‘Miss Noel killed Jeffrey’.
Tova Noel, 37, was one of two Metropolitan Correctional Center officers charged with overseeing Epstein’s jail cell in the days leading up to his death
An inmate claims he heard Noel saying she would cover up Epstein’s death on the morning he was found hanged, an FBI report in the Epstein files read
In disarray: Epstein’s cell shortly after his death with orange clothes and sheets strewn around
The inmate’s account has not been confirmed but has fueled fresh questions on the nature of Epstein’s death in prison.
The disgraced financier’s official cause of death was suicide after the New York medical examiner and the US Department of Justice’s investigation.
However, a forensic pathologist hired by Epstein’s estate, Dr Michael Baden, said that the injuries on his body were more akin to strangulation than suicidal hanging when he attended the autopsy.
Tova Noel has also had previous questions raised about her in connection with Epstein’s death when it was discovered that strange $5,000 cash bank deposits were made into her account on July 30, 2019, ten days before Epstein was found dead.
There were 11 other similar deposits made dating from December 2018, totalling $11,880. However, her bank records also reveal that she was making payments on a brand new Range Rover.
She was not asked about the cash in her interview by the Department of Justice.
It was also found that she had been Googling Epstein just minutes before he was found dead at 6.30am.
Around 40 minutes before Epstein was discovered, Noel was revealed to have Google searched ‘latest on epstein in jail(sic),’ according to documents released on Thursday by the Department of Justice, first reported by the NY Post.
The entries at 5.42am and 5.52am were included in searches on two other inmates held in the prison, Kenyatta Taiste and Omar Amanat, as well as a search for ‘law enforcement discounts’ at 6.17am and 6.19am, documents show.
A medic performing CPR on Jeffrey Epstein after he was found hanged in his cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC) in New York
Orange fabric identified at the scene of Epstein’s death. The noose the financier allegedly used has never been officially identified
Noel was revealed to have Googled ‘latest on epstein in jail (sic)’ 40 minutes before his death
A strange $5,000 cash deposit was made ten days before Epstein’s death
Noel denied Googling Epstein in questioning in 2021, and said: ‘I don’t remember doing that.’
She was also believed to be the last correctional officer to have visited the SHU before Epstein’s death that night.
An internal FBI briefing heard that at around 10.40pm an officer, believed to be Noel, ‘carried linen or inmate clothing up to the L-Tier’.
This was allegedly the ‘last time any correctional officer approached the only entrance to the SHU tier’, the briefing heard.
Epstein hanged himself with strips of orange cloth, New York City Chief Medical Examiner found at the time.
Noel said in a sworn statement that she had last seen Epstein alive ‘somewhere around after ten’, but said she ‘never gave out linen, ever’ or any clothing. She claimed that those responsibilities were done in the shift before.
She added she did not know why Epstein had access to extra linen in his cell and that the other guard had been asleep from 10pm to 12pm.
According to her statement, neglecting to do rounds in the prison’s SHU was a common practice.
‘I’ve never worked in the Special Housing Unit and actually done rounds every 30 minutes,’ she told investigators, according to documents.
Noel denied any involvement in Epstein’s death. She has not been charged with any crime.
Epstein was found with three fractures on the left and right sides of his larynx and his estate’s pathologist said that ‘those fractures are extremely unusual in suicidal hangings and could occur much more commonly in homicidal strangulation’.
He added that there was also hemorrhaging in Epstein’s eyes, more common with strangulation than hanging.
The Daily Mail has contacted Tova Noel’s lawyer for a comment.