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Committee

The House investigative committee has made public a collection of approximately 70 photographs from the estate of deceased convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

This represents the third release from a tranche of in excess of 95,000 photographs the committee has acquired from Epstein's holdings. It includes images of passages from the book Lolita inscribed across a woman's body, and redacted pictures of women's international passports.

This disclosure comes hours before the 19th of December cut-off for the Justice Department to disclose every documents associated with its probe into Epstein.

"These new photos bring up additional queries about what exactly the Department of Justice has in its possession," stated the ranking member of the committee, Robert Garcia.

What's in the Images Made Public

A number of the photos released on Thursday feature Epstein conversing with academic and activist Noam Chomsky aboard a private plane; Bill Gates seen alongside a woman whose face is redacted; Steve Bannon seated at a table across from Epstein, and ex- Alphabet president Sergey Brin at a dinner event.

Committee

These are the latest affluent, prominent individuals to be pictured in Epstein property images published by the House Oversight Committee - formerly released pictures also depict US President Donald Trump and past president Bill Clinton, as well as film director Woody Allen, ex- US treasury secretary Larry Summers, lawyer Alan Dershowitz, Andrew Mountbatton-Windsor, and additional individuals.

Showing up in the photographs is not indication of any illegal activity, and a number of the pictured figures have asserted they were in no way implicated in Epstein's unlawful actions.

In a statement released with the photograph disclosure, Lawmakers on the US House Oversight Committee stated the Epstein estate did not offer background information or dates for the pictures.

"Photographs were chosen to offer the public with openness into a illustrative selection of the images received from the property, and to provide insights into Epstein's network and his extremely troubling activities," the statement states.

Investigative Body

The release also includes a number of images of quotes from the Vladimir Nabokov literary work Lolita written in black ink across several locations of a woman's body, including her upper body, foot, hip, and spine. Lolita tells the account of a minor who was exploited by a middle-aged literature professor.

One quote from the novel written across a woman's chest says, "Lolita's name: the point of the tongue traveling of three steps down the mouth to alight, at three, on the teeth".

Additionally, there are a series of photos of women's identification and identification documents from states around the world, such as Lithuania, Russia, the Czech Republic, and Ukraine.

Oversight Panel

Most of the information on the papers, such as identities and dates of birth, is redacted but the panel indicated in a press release that the passports pertain to "females whom Jeffrey Epstein and his conspirators were interacting with".

A further image shows Epstein seated at a desk intimately in the company of three women whose features have been obscured - a first has her palm on Epstein's chest under his shirt, and a second is bending to examine a close-by computer. Epstein appears to be assisting the third individual put on a wristband.

Oversight Panel

Another image released is a capture of text messages from an unnamed sender who claims they have been supplied "several females" and are demanding "$$1,000 per female".

Photo Release Comes Before DOJ Cut-off

The committee has thousands of photos in its holdings from the Epstein estate, which are "both graphic and everyday," its press release on Thursday clarified.

The House Oversight Committee first issued a subpoena to the property of Epstein, who was found dead in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on accusations of sex trafficking crimes, in August.

The images and records the Epstein property submitted to the body are distinct from what is often termed "the Epstein documents". Those files are documents within the DOJ's possession related to its own investigation into Epstein.

Pursuant to the recently passed law, which President Trump signed into law last month, the DOJ has until the date of 19 December to disclose its files. The full nature of what's included in the DOJ's records is unknown, and it's expected that a significant portion of the information will be significantly obscured, similar to House Oversight Committee documents