Barclays CEO Jes Staley contradicts JP Morgan chief’s claim they never discussed Epstein

theguardian.com:

The former JPMorgan Chase executive and ex-Barclays CEO Jes Staley has alleged that he communicated with JP Morgan’s chief executive, Jamie Dimon, about the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a contradiction of Dimon’s testimony, in a lawsuit brought by the US Virgin Islands against JP Morgan.

In a report on Wednesday, the Wall Street Journalsaid it had obtained legal papers in the case in which Staley claimed that he communicated with Dimon about the bank’s business with Epstein after the disgraced financier was arrested in Florida in 2006 for sexually abusing girls and pleaded guilty to soliciting and procuring a minor for prostitution two years later.

Staley, who has yet to be deposed under oath, also claimed that Dimon communicated with him about whether to maintain Epstein as a client before he was dropped in 2012.

A spokesperson for JPMorgan Chase rejected Staley’s claim. “We believe this is false. There is no evidence that any such communications ever occurred – nothing in the voluminous number of documents reviewed and nothing in the nearly dozen depositions taken, including that of our own CEO,” they told the Journal.

The bank said that during a deposition last Friday, Dimon had repeated his position that he never met with Epstein, “never emailed him, does not recall ever discussing his accounts internally, and was not involved in any decisions about his account”.

“The one person who claims this to be true is currently accused of horrific acts and dishonesty – and hasn’t been deposed,” the bank added, according to the Journal.

The battle between Staley and Dimon is becoming the centerpiece of claims by the US Virgin Islands that JP Morgan profited from its relationship with Epstein even after he was convicted in