How we identified missing documents from Epstein filespublished at 11:53 GMT
Alison Benjamin and Benedict Garman
BBC Verify
On Sunday, BBC Verify investigated the reported removal of at least 13 documents from the US Department of Justice’s (DoJ) release of files related to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. One was said to include a photo featuring Donald Trump.
To identify which images were missing we compared the filenames of documents published on the day of the release – 19 December – with those still available on the justice department website on 21 December. That highlighted 14 files which were in the earlier release but not the later one.
We then tested the web addresses for each of these documents on the DoJ website and found 13 were inaccessible at the time of checking. Ten of the files were images of a massage parlour. Most faces in the images are redacted, but one woman’s face is inconsistently redacted across files and another is unredacted throughout.
To check whether a picture featuring Trump had been temporarily removed, we searched the file’s web address in the Wayback Machine, which records snapshots of web pages over time and allows users to see what they looked like at specific points in the past.
Image source, US Department of Justice
It showed one file – a photo of a desk with an open drawer where two pictures of Trump can be seen – was available on 19 December but inaccessible throughout 20 December.
The DoJ said in a post on X on Sunday,, external that the image was removed temporarily “for potential further action to protect victims” and it had acted “out of an abundance of caution”.
The DoJ said the file was later reinstated – unredacted – after it determined that no Epstein victims were depicted in the photo.
Trump has consistently denied any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein and has not been accused of any crimes by Epstein’s victims. There is no suggestion that these pictures imply any wrongdoing.
