NEW YORK, NY. (THECOUNT) — Igor Zinoviev is a former UFC fighter who worked as Jeffrey Epstein‘s personal bodyguard and driver.
Zinoviev, 53, worked for the late billionaire for about six years around the time he pleaded guilty in Florida to soliciting an underage girl for prostitution.
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The former octagon fighter delivered a “paranoid interview” recently claiming the billionaire pedophile had “help killing himself” in jail.
In an interview with New York Magazine following Epstein’s apparent suicide, Zinoviev said he believes the 66-year-old had help ending his life. He also retracted previous comments he had made in 2015 about Epstein’s association with teenage girls and refused to say whether he had been contacted by the FBI in the wake of his death.
“Somebody helped him to do that,” Zinoviev said when he was asked what he thought about Epstein’s death in federal custody, reports Dailymail.
Zinoviev refused to elaborate on exactly how that might have transpired, saying: “Listen, you know, that’s going a little too deep”, insert Russian accent here.
Earlier today, the body of Epstein was claimed from the New York City medical examiner’s office, sources say.
The person who claimed Epstein’s body was described only as an “Epstein associate, reports AOL on Thursday.”
In other Epstein news, we are now learning his Manhattan mansion featured an oil painting of former President Bill Clinton wearing a blue dress and red high heels.
The painting was discovered by law enforcement hanging in a room in Epstein’s palatial townhouse in New York City, according to the New York Post.
“It was hanging up there prominently — as soon as you walked in — in a room to the right,” a source told the newspaper. “Everybody who saw it laughed and smirked,” reports BizpacReview.
The image is one of Clinton in the Oval Office, legs draped over a chair flashing red heels and wearing a blue dress reminiscent of the one infamously worn by former White House intern, Monica Lewinsky or by his wife Hillary.
DailyMail reported Wednesday that a visitor to Epstein’s luxurious Manhattan mansion confirmed the existence of the painting.
Epstein’s visitor, a woman who said she was meeting with the financier in 2012 to discuss a business proposal, spotted a grotesque image of America’s 42nd president through an open door, according to the Daily Mail.
Meanwhile, the late Epstein sustained multiple breaks in his neck bones, deepening the mystery about the circumstances surrounding his “suicide” death.
“Such breaks can occur in those who hang themselves … but they are more common in victims of homicide by strangulation,” reports FlagAndCross.
TheCount.com has not independently substantiated the claims reported by FlagAndCross on Wednesday.
In related news and less than an hour before the first news reports surfaced that Epstein had been found unresponsive in his jail cell, a post about his death mysteriously appeared on a far-right message board.
Authorities now want to know who was behind the post, which contained medically accurate details about the financier and accused sex trafficker, reports NBCNews on Tuesday.
The New York City Fire Department, for its part, has determined that the information in the post did not come from its records, a department spokesperson told NBC News. Fire officials reviewed the post on 4chan, a forum popular with internet trolls and people in the so-called alt-right movement.
Correctional officers at the New York City prison housing, MCC, didn’t check in on Jeffrey Epstein for hours leading up to his apparent suicide on Saturday after his cellmate was transferred for reasons that were not immediately clear, according to DLM on Monday.
The New York chief medical examiner released the below statement Sunday regarding the completed autopsy of the late billionaire.
Epstein was found dead from apparent suicide in his New York City jail cell Saturday.
“Today, a medical examiner performed the autopsy of Jeffrey Epstein. The ME’s determination is pending further information at this time. At the request of those representing the decedent, and with the awareness of the federal prosecutor, I allowed a private pathologist (Dr. Michael Baden) to observe the autopsy examination. This is routine practice.”
Jeffrey Epstein‘s suicide death may never be conclusively determined, because of the lockup’s standard practice of not filming activity that occurs in cells.
Cameras in the Special Housing Unit where Epstein was housed – do not point inside cells.
Sources familiar with the correctional facility in question told TMZ, there are cameras in the Special Housing Unit — the SHU — but SOP is that cameras do not point into the cells. We’re told cameras capture, among other things, the doors to each cell to determine if anyone walks in or out, but they don’t point inside, TMZ.
Sources familiar with the facility says the drill is for guards to pass by each cell in intervals ranging from 15 to 30 minutes depending on the circumstances.
Unless there’s a one-off cell with a camera pointing inside — and we’re told there have been rare situations where this is the case — the time and manner of his death may never be captured.
However, since Epstein was taken off suicide watch there were plenty of ways he could have hung himself. There are sheets, blankets, t-shirts and there are objects — including beds — on which the items can be tied to facilitate suffocation.
DEVELOPING::
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