Trump told Palm Beach police chief 'everyone' knew about Epstein and 'evil' Maxwell

Latest FBI doc in Files contradicts Trump's prior claims

Our latest reporting in the Miami Herald is about an FBI report buried deep in the files. It is an FBI 302 — a witness interview — with the former Palm Beach police chief, a man who many people might not know.

Michael Reiter was a quiet hero behind the scenes. If it wasn’t for him, the Epstein case would have died in Palm Beach County back in 2006.

Reiter has kept a low profile since retiring from the Palm Beach Police Department in 2009. He headed the small island beach police force in 2005, when the stepmother of a 14-year-old girl reported that her stepdaughter was molested by Epstein.

That report led to more reports from teenage girls, most of them from Royal Palm Beach High School. Reiter’s lead detective on the case, Joe Recarey, put the pieces together after interviewing dozens of girls who were brought to Epstein’s Palm Beach mansion. The girls were told they were being hired to give a wealthy old man a “massage” — which was really a trap for Epstein to fondle and sexually assault them.

Epstein was arrested on July 23, 2006 on a solicitation charge. And he would have likely paid a fine or received probation and been on his merry way.

Instead, Reiter fought to charge him with more serious charges involving sex with minors. When the state attorney, Barry Krischer, rebuffed Reiter’s efforts, Reiter took the case to the FBI.

Now, an FBI interview conducted in 2019 about that early Epstein investigation has shed more light on what Donald Trump knew — and when he knew what Epstein was doing.