Robert Trivers, a prominent evolutionary biologist who taught at Rutgers University for two decades before leaving amid controversy in 2014, had a relationship with disgraced sex offender Jeffrey Epstein that included “major funding” and at least one “wonderful lunch” that featured a “bevy of beauties,” according to the latest batch of documents released by the Department of Justice.
In an email exchange with prominent MIT professor Noam Chomsky in October of 2015 that was released Friday, Epstein referred to himself as Trivers’ “major funder” after he “got thrown out of Rutgers for good this time.”
In 2015, Trivers acknowledged to Reuters that he received about $40,000 from Epstein “to study the relationship between knee symmetry and sprinting ability.” At the time, many charities were beginning to refuse to accept donations from Epstein as public criticism of him mounted.
When an assistant named asked Epstein for a scientist to answer the question “How has Jeffery Epstein’s donations helped you advance your research?” for a story in the Huffington Post, the sex offender told her that she “should contact robert trivers.”
“Jeffrey’s support included discussions with him, which were valuable mostly because he is extremely bright, open-minded and widely travelled,” Trivers told the Huffington Post in 2017, per emails released by the House Oversight Committee. “The key is that he gives me consistent, warm support without me having to write endless applications for grants, and trusts me to put it to good use, as indeed I do.“
Trivers, now 82, did not reply to requests for comment from NJ Advance Media over the weekend. A Rutgers spokesperson acknowledged receipt of an email requesting comment but did not reply at time of publication.
It is unclear when Trivers and Epstein first connected — they connected on LinkedIn in July of 2013, per an email from the company to Epstein — but the two maintained their relationship after Epstein pleaded guilty for procuring a child for prostitution in 2008, and were in frequent communication as late as 2018, per emails released by the DOJ.
Trivers consistently defended his friend amid rising public scrutiny of his past, in public and private.
In the same 2015 interview with Reuters, Trivers called the convicted sex offender “a person of integrity” and said he did not see Epstein’s acts “as so heinous” because he believes girls mature earlier than in the past.
“By the time they’re 14 or 15, they’re like grown women were 60 years ago,” he said.
In a 2018 message to Epstein, Trivers lamented the “strong national trend” of well-known men “being brought low for alleged misbehaviour toward women,” according to the Chronicle of Higher Education.
The two spent time together outside of academia. In a message sent from his Rutgers email account on Saturday, January 28, 2012, Trivers thanked Epstein for a “wonderful lunch” that was a “REAL pleasure.”
“Quite apart from the bevy of beauties and the prickly Nobel Prize winner who could only say that his work concerned “smell”, it was great seeing you in such good form and shape,” Trivers wrote. “I look forward to seeing you again in the not too distant future.”
The two remained in touch through the end of Trivers’ tumultuous tenure at Rutgers, which came shortly after he was suspended in 2014 for telling students he knew nothing about the “Human Aggression” class he was assigned to teach.
Epstein checked in with Trivers early and often during the suspension.
“what is your status with rutgers.?” Epstein wrote in an email dated February 14, 2014. “not that i give a shit.”
In April of 2015, Trivers emailed Epstein to let him know he would be signing “a nondisclosure agreement as well as a non-defamation one—can not tell anyone the details of the buyout nor make any negative statements about Rutgers.”
“i am sick of talking about them as it is,” Trivers wrote.
Epstein supported Trivers following his departure from Rutgers, giving him a $30,000 gift to his foundation, according to an email in April of 2015. A $30,000 check issued to Trivers is included in the files released by the DOJ.
In separate emails, Trivers called the gift “a great blessing in my life” and said he “could not be more grateful” for Epstein’s help.
“My youngest daughter broke into tears when i told her (age 32) and she said, daddy you are so lucky to have friends who love you and respect your wok enough to help you when you are down — and her tears brought one or two to me,” Trivers wrote.
Three years later, in December of 2018, Trivers sent an email to Epstein apologizing “for requesting support in what was originally intended as an update on work done.”
”you once said you would ‘never not support me,’” Trivers wrote. “but never, as we both know, is a very long time.”
